Life Sentence
by Llewlyn
Summary: Discombobulation Challenge: BJ is forced to serve time on Earth, bound in human form for the damage he caused to a certain Lydia Deetz. He is determined to make amends somehow. But Lydia is not prepared for the damage that he can wreak, just by breathing.
1. How the Other Half Lives

**Disclaimer: **Just playin'. Honest, i'll put him back.**  
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**Written for the Discombobulation Challenge devised by WitchyWanda and Llewlyn**

1. Can be written in cartoon or movie Beetleverse

2. Must _inconvenience_ BJ in some extreme way-- body switch him, strip him of his powers, send him to the Living, put him in a magic lamp-- be creative!

3. Any genre, any rating-- do something you are great at, or something you have never done before!.

**That's it!**

So, without further ado, my take on the Discombobulation Challenge: **_Life Sentence  
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**Chapter 1: How the Other Half Lives  
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Beetlejuice waited . And waited. He paced. He spent several days trying to return his head to normal size. He paced some more. He swore. He learned French so that he could curse in more than one language. And then Sanskrit, which had all sorts of interesting curses that involved elephants, dhotis, and self-immolation. He translated the entire works of Shakespeare into Kikuyu, using a brush the width of a single hair and ink pressed from deadly nightshade berries. And when his number was finally called, he was staring into space, and almost missed it.

"Numberninemillionfourhundredandfortythreethousandninehunderedandtwentythree?" The receptionist peered at Beetlejuice, who was blearily focused on the middle distance between the tip of his miniaturized nose and the airplane plant hanging from the ceiling above the water fountain. She shrugged, and was moving onto the next number, when he roused his tiny little head, blinking sleepily.

"Eh? Whazzat?" He squinted at her, and she rolled her eyes and pointed at the number readout. He unearthed his number from the piles of parchment and quill pens and crushed berry skins, and compared them blearily. "Huh. And I was just getting to the good part." He stretched, scattering everything in all directions, and shuffled through the door, leaving the disgruntled receptionist scowling at the toppled stacks of papers.

Once in the Hallway, Juno fell in beside him, for once not sucking on a cigarette. She was quiet, and even the sight of her old partner's head shrunk to the size of a wizened grapefruit couldn't draw a smile from her. Neither of them spoke until they reached her office, and she closed the door with a finality that made Beetlejuice realize that this was much more serious than he had originally thought. He sat down with a sense of foreboding and did his level best to scowl. "What?" Damn his voice for squeaking. He growled in disgust but it came out like a chirpy kitten purr.

Juno stared at the notorious poltergeist for a moment, an unreadable expression on her face. Then she reached into her desk and pulled out an envelope made from fine ivory parchment and handed it to him. He raised an eyebrow at her.

"Are we not talking? Is this some secret society thing I don't know about? Vow of silence? Political statement?"

"Beetlejuice, you have really screwed up this time. I did my best, but there is no defending you sometimes. You never had a chance, after that incident with the little girl." Juno finally lit a cigarette, and settled back in her chair.

"Little girl?" He fingered the envelope nervously. It was heavy.

Juno looked exasperated. "Lydia? You tried to force a human girl to marry you?"

His tiny brow furrowed in thought. "I might recall something about it, maybe. But hey, no harm done, eh?" He attempted a casual smirk, but Juno would have none of it. She gestured to the envelope.

"You might as well open it. It's from the Administration. You know they'll get you to read it eventually." Something about the bleakness in her eyes gave Beetlejuice a shiver. He reluctantly broke the seal on the envelope and unfolded it. And read it. And read it again.

There was a long silence. And then, in a squeaky voice, as if his throat had constricted even tighter, he read it.

"The Administration has found you, Betelgeuse, guilty of gross negligence and the endangerment of the carefully guarded secrets of life after death. You, Betelgeuse, have been sentenced to life, to be executed immediately, and to continue for one year and one day, or until such time as you have made adequate reparations to the injured parties of the Administration, and to the living human, Lydia Deetz." He crumpled the parchment savagely. "A life sentence, eh?"

"You'll get your wish, Beetlejuice," said Juno, and was that a twinge of sadness in her voice? He couldn't tell, because his hearing was strangely muffled. "You get to get out." He grabbed on to the edge of her desk. This was definitely _not_ what he wanted.

"Juno! Don't let them do this! I'll do anything! This is extreme! I didn't get due process! I demand a recount!" He felt himself slipping, but Juno just took a deep drag from her cigarette and watched him fade out. Odd, but she didn't feel as satisfied as she thought she would. A life sentence for such a ghost as he… well, it really didn't bear thinking about. She switched on her computer, and tried to concentrate on the latest incoming suicides that needed placement on the clerical staff. Ah well, what was a year and a day? He would be back annoying her before she got her office aired out.


	2. Have a Nice Day

**Disclaimer: **Just playin'. I'll put him back, promise.

**Chapter 2: Have a Nice Day**

A sharp intake of breath skittered across the quiet hum of back alley generators. Beetlejuice woke quickly, but immediately wished he could pass out again. A cold wash of unpleasant sensory information swept over him in a wave. His hands, pressed against sharp gravel underneath him, his spine twisted awkwardly against the contorted position he was lying in, his mouth dry and bitter-tasting, and his stomach and head competing for the award for Most Painful Throbbing… definitely needed to pass out. Motherless goat of all motherless goats. He was alive.

"Oooh…" He rolled over and attempted to sit up. On the first try, he completely misjudged his own weight and barely lifted himself halfway. "Great. I'm a weakling. Any more humiliation in store?" he muttered to himself. He shoved against the ground and made it to his knees, and then with a huge effort staggered to his feet . Dizzyness threatened to send him right back down again, and he grabbed his head in both hands. Well, at least they had returned his head to normal size. That was thoughtful.

When his head had stopped spinning, unfortunately not literally, he sighed heavily and looked around him. It was dark. He could no longer see through the shadows. And it was cold. Funny how that hadn't bothered him before. He reached down to rummage through his pockets and discovered that he didn't have any. In fact, his coat was missing. He was wearing a much faded pair of wool trousers and a grubby black-ish t-shirt that stretched too tight over his thin chest and arms. His had jumped automatically up to check his earring, but that, at least, was still with him. There was a bulge in his back pocket, and he reached back and tugged out a folded wallet.

More weary than curious, he opened it. No credit cards, an old driver's license that didn't even _look_ like him… he squinted at it, reading the name in the fading light. Douglas Michaels. "Nice and boring," he muttered. And expired, too. In 1982. "Lovely." He flipped open the pockets and counted several hundred dollars in ragged, dirty notes. That cheered him considerably—at least he could get rip-roaring drunk for a few weeks before the money ran out. And then, folded in one of the card pockets and written in spidery hand was a note that read, _Life Sentence commenced. Have a nice day. The Administration._

"Hardy-frickin'-har, boys." Beetlejuice stood and thought for a moment. A few hundred bucks—those idiots were so out of touch that they probably thought they had given him enough to rent a condo for a year and nosh on caviar and tea. A couple hundred would last a month, if he didn't drink. A week, since he was definitely going to drink. What else? Expired identification. And none of his scare, none of his glow, none of his porting or vanishing or reality-altering. Just his wit and charm, for an entire year. He nodded his head. "I'm screwed." But there was something just on the edge of his memory… some hope. Something the sentencing letter had mentioned.

No. Not something. Someone.

Lydia Deetz.

He sighed, his breath hitching painfully in his throat. If possible, he was even more screwed.


	3. I Heart NYC

**AN: **Oddly, the line tag is non-functional. Huh. Well, guess we'll have to do without. If you have noticed, this story is going a little more slowly than usual-- i'm back at work now. Yay. I mean, yay! Thank you, those of you who have given this odd little story a chance, and thank you, Sesshoumarusmisstress and WitchyWanda, for reviewing! It means more than you will ever know-- water in the desert... On to the city...

**Chapter 3: I Heart NYC**

Finding a person had never been particularly difficult as a ghost. Humans and spirits alike resonated with unique energy like a signature, visible in the wide spectrum not-visible by the living. As a ghost, Beetlejuice would have had no problem at all pinpointing the vivid purple energy that was Lydia Deetz. That made it all the more irritating for him as he stood at the edge of an alleyway that jutted out onto Times Square, blinking at the incomprehensible crowd. Business men and women in fussy suits, tourists in **I Heart NYC** t-shirts with disposable cameras clutched tightly in their hands, as if any respectable thief would be interested in _pictures_ of Times Square; beggars and buskers—the frickin' hoi polloi… and nothing familiar at all.

Of course, New York itself was familiar to him, although he hadn't been to the city in a few decades. Nothing much changed in big cities. Clean parts got dirty, dirty parts got filthy, people prospered and starved. At least there wasn't horseshit and raw sewage all over the streets. That was a bonus. He brushed himself off ineffectually and thought of a plan.

1. Get drunk.

That was a good plan. He nodded to himself and struck out into the street, and then immediately had to revisit his plan.

1. Find a bar.

2. Get drunk.

There. That just about covered it. He knew eventually he would have to add:

3. Find Lydia Deetz.

But he just wasn't quite ready to face that little girl again. Not yet.

A few hours later and a moderate two sheets to the wind, Beetlejuice stepped off the curb of the third bar he had been impolitely asked to leave. He spewed off a few curses involving incontinent camels and something that sounded like _mes couilles sur ton nez_… he wasn't sure but he thought that might be French. It sounded French. The crowd outside had changed considerably as he had wandered further into the darkness towards East Village, where he had once haunted McSorley's, a fine pub, in the 1800's. He was feeling nostalgic and a little homesick, and truth be told, a little sick, too.

Drinking had never affected him very much as a poltergeist—certainly not the inconveniences of a straining bladder and lack of balance. He had completely forgotten at the first bar that he would have to use the toilet until it was nearly too late, and the sensation was immensely painful. He thought he might have pushed a few people over, but he made it. Except it was the wrong bathroom. Who would think that a pub needed separate bathrooms for guys and gals? Well, anyway, at the second bar he had been more prepared. They had thrown him out for entirely different reasons. The third bar was kind of fuzzy—it had been full of well-dressed young women and he had been having the time of his short life… well, maybe he did remember why they had kicked him out of that one. But it had been worth it!

Now his living body was sending all sorts of strange signals to him, only a few of which he actually had a clue about. His legs felt funny and kind of numb, and his stomach was feeling kind of hollow—he thought that might be hunger. When he had been alive the first time, that has been a pretty common state of affairs. But his hearing was sort of blurry, which hadn't been the case before he had gone into that last bar. He came upon a group of women on the corner and was about to saunter suavely by when, to his astonishment, he recognized a face.

"Jenna?" His voice came out both gruff and squeaky. Very suave. The woman he thought he recognized jumped and turned to stare at him. She looked shaken.

"Do I know you?" He looked more closely at her, and realized he had made a mistake.

He shrugged. "Sorry. Though I knew you."

She paused for a moment, and then said, quietly, "Jenna was my sister."

"Ha! Knew you looked familiar!" He beamed blearily. She looked carefully at him.

"You knew her?"

"Oh, yeah! Jenna and me go way back! Good friend, good girl." She narrowed her eyes at him. A tiny warning bell sounded tinnily in the back of his head, but he dismissed it, as always, as unimportant.

The woman frowned, a glimmer in her eye. "Jenna's dead, mister. Didn't you know, since you were such good friends?" This last was said with heavy sarcasm.

"Yep! Death didn't improve her opinion of men, I tell ya!" he snorted. And then his little universe exploded into pain and red stars. He staggered back, holding his hand to his jaw. The woman's face was crossed with horror and fury.

"How dare you! If I find out you had anything to do with it, I'll kill you!"

He looked at her, feeling incredibly slow. And then, a dawning realization. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Jenna was _dead._ He met her _after she died._ And she had told him the whole sordid story—she had been murdered by one of her johns. She had shown him the cuts and bruises around her throat, and he had been at a rare loss for words. Humans thought that _ghosts_ were scary? He backed away, his hands raised in defense, feeling for the first time very vulnerable.

"Hey, I never woulda harmed that girl. Like I said, we was friends. Thassal. I'm sorry." And he was, but he didn't want to stick around and get killed for it, either. Throwing both dignity and caution to the wind, he ran like hell into the relative safety of the darkened streets.


	4. Stray

**AN: **Woo! Long chapter. I think i am writing this backwards, because chapters 5 and 6 were already scribbled out in the notebook before i managed to figure this one out. This has been almost entirely a pen and paper affair. Sometimes it just works that way...

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**Chapter 4: Stray**

Beetlejuice was rapidly coming to the conclusion that he needed to find Lydia Deetz sooner rather than later. He wasn't any good at this living thing and was nervous that he would get himself killed before he made good with her, whatever that meant. And if that were the case, it was entirely possible that he would just…die. Cease to exist. A blip vanished from the map, a star from the sky.

That was just not gonna happen.

From his fuzzy brain and generally poor sense of direction, due mostly to the fact that he hadn't needed to find north for roughly six hundred years, he thought that he might be heading away from Central Park. Past Times Square was…no, Harlem was _above_ Central Park, wasn't it? Well, then this way was the East Village. Some streets in between. He had never bothered to walk all the way down Broadway, now that he thought about it. Never had to. Being alive was really inconvenient.

As he passed street after street and alley after alley, heading deeper into the dark city, his mind began to wander, and as it had had a lot of practice at wandering, he was soon almost entirely disconnected from his sore and weary and hungry body. And his thoughts focused in one direction: Lydia Deetz. Dark little chit of a girl, very gloomy. She was hardly out of diapers, he thought derisively, blithely overlooking his intentions to marry her. Not like he would ever have consummated said union. She really wasn't his type. He liked curvy. If he remembered correctly, and he _always_ remembered correctly about women, she was a little on the scrawny side.

And what was this all about 'making good' with her? He hadn't done any permanent harm to the kid—no one could blame him if she was _weird, _since that had happened _way_ before he met her. Never for a moment did it cross his mind that he might carry a heavier moral responsibility than a sixteen year old girl. And she had started it, anyway. She was the one that had wanted to cross over in the first place. All this talk about jumping off bridges. She would have ended up a secretary in some dimly lit smoky back office, smacking gum and irritating visitors for the next century or so. Nowhere to go but down.

So what was _he_ supposed to do about it? He certainly wasn't going to apologize. Nothin' to apologize for, anyway. What other sixteen year old girl could claim that she knew the handsome world-renowned poltergeist Betelgeuse? As he saw it, he had done her a _favor._ In fact, he didn't really need to see her after all, did he? He could just get on a boat headed for Jamaica and spend out his year in sunny bliss. The East River led to the ocean eventually, didn't it?

Thinking such cheerful thoughts, Beetlejuice crossed E 23rd St, passing from Flatiron to Union Square, with his favorite pub less than a mile away, and he never even heard them coming. As a ghost, it would have never been possible to sneak up on him, so the possibility that he might be caught unawares never crossed his mind, until it happened. With quick and brutal efficiency he was taken down, robbed, kicked, and thoroughly humbled in less than half a minute.

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For just a moment, he kneeled on the neatly swept sidewalk, listening to the running footsteps of his attackers melt into the alleyways and backyards of the handsome Civil War era townhomes that surrounded him. His ribs ached, but his pride hurt much, much worse. As he sat, he began to feel a strange sensation welling up from the pit of his belly. What had just happened… it wasn't just about the money, or the bruised ribs. He had, in a few seconds, lost something so much more intimate—his feeling of invulnerability lay shattered in the street in front of him.

Why he struggled to his feet and continued on toward the pub, he would never be able to explain. Some machine of fate had caught him up, and he hardly was aware of its movements until he looked up in a daze and saw the wide windowpanes and rough oak door of McSorley's Pub. He was standing and staring still when a crowd of young people in brightly colored tattoos and piercings flocked out, laughing and chatting. Huh, he thought. When did they start lettin' women in? He watched them pass by in a slow-motion haze, when one stunningly recognizable profile, pale beneath dark eye makeup and spiky bangs, jumped into clear focus. Before he could think better of it, her name escaped his lips. "Lydia!"

She turned at the sound of that voice. The man who had uttered her name with such deep and familiar passion was a stranger. His wild blonde-white hair straggled wildly in all directions, curling over his forehead and ears. Brilliant green eyes in a thin, well-defined face, and a blackening bruise on his cheek. Lean, dirty, and scuffed, he was a complete stranger. But that voice… that voice she would know in her sleep. Her jaw unhinged slowly in pure astonishment. "Holy hell! Who let you out?"

He cocked his jaw slightly askew. That was completely not what he was expecting. Lydia's friends paused with her, interested but not prying, and pretended to continue their conversations. She carefully stepped a little closer, as if moving suddenly might set him off like a landmine. Beetlejuice responded in kind, though he would never have admitted it.

"I'm here because of you, Lyds." He lifted a dramatically upswept eyebrow at her. When she crinkled her dainty brow at him in confusion, he made a little dog-circle with his hands outspread. "No nuclear weapons, no snakes, no rings. I got nothin'!" Okay, so that last word might have come out a little harsh. He tried again. "Except you."

Her mouth twitched in the shadow of a sneer. "Well, then, you've got nothing." She tuned to go and her friends moved to close ranks, and a searing heat burst in his stomach. She was going to _leave him_. He jumped in front of her, blocking her path, and thought frantically. A boy with dark hair and a scowl shouldered between them, but Lydia put a placating hand on his arm and shook her head. Beetlejuice flashed him a smart-ass grin, but returned his attention to Lydia before he could be bothered to notice the boy's reaction.

"You can't leave me, Lyds. I got less than nothin'. They left me here, and I'm… I'm—oh, it's too horrible to think about! I don't wanna think about it. I'm not gonna talk about it." He cut through the air with his hands in quick, jerking motions. The boy took her arm and tried to pull her away, but she shook him off with a scowl. His over-protectiveness was working in Beetlejuice's favor, plus the punky kid had pimples. Beetlejuice reached out to take her hand, and she tried to pull away from him. Before he could right himself, the boy shoved him back, and Beetlejuice, surprised, lost his balance and fell to his knees.

Lydia turned, irritated, to the boy and spoke in a quiet voice. "It's okay, Benji. He's an old… friend." She knelt down beside him, then. "BJ, what on earth happened to you?"

This was his last chance. He could feel it like the tolling of the last bell. He summoned every humiliation, every hurt, every scrap of feeling that he could manage, and peered at her through his eyelashes. "Take me home, and I'll tell you everything."

She scowled. He noticed that she was very clearly not melting, but scowling. "Is this some trick of yours?"

He gaped at her, and then glanced down at his battered body. More gently than he felt, he took her hand and pressed it against his chest.

"Does this feel like a trick?"

She had shifted her weight to pull away, but then froze, her fingers pressing more deeply into his chest. She even bent down as if to listen, and he caught the faint scent of oranges and sandalwood.

"Your heart… it's _beating_. And you're…" She lifted her eyes to his and for a moment, they were mere inches apart. "…warm."

He pressed the only advantage he had. "Take me home, Lydia." His voice was a whiskey whisper. "Anything you want to know." And then he steeled himself, because of what had to be said next. "Please."

Her eyes had fallen to his mouth, to watch him speak, and then she sighed, and he knew he had won.

"Why can I never say no to you?"

He caged his triumph in a dangerous, feral smile.


	5. Uncle Dougie

**AN: **Goodness, i go away for an internet-free weekend and am just completely stunned at the stories waiting to be read this afternoon! I love this community! You all rock. Seriously. So, _Life Sentence_ has taken a considerably darker turn than i had originally intended, so i hope you can stick with me. The more i sleep on this story, the tougher it comes out for our beloved poltergeist. Also, i want to make new art for this story, as is traditional now-- if anyone feels inspired to create something for **Glow**, i'll be delighted to post it. Hugs to everyone, and on with the show.

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**Chapter 5: Uncle Dougie**

Benji scowled all the way to Lydia's door. "I don't like that he's staying with you, Lydia. He looks really… unbalanced." She gave him a very skeptical look and then turned to the poltergeist-cum-human who was sauntering along beside her, his hands tucked in his pockets, and his elfin features carefully arranged in an expression of mocking innocence. She rolled her eyes, thinking that had he still been a poltergeist, he would be wearing a shiny halo. She turned her attention back to her angry boyfriend.

"Benj, he's an old friend. Really old," she added. "He's like my crazy uncle, or something." But Benji refused to be placated, and tried the whole walk home to talk Lydia into letting him stay over with her and the 'strange man.' At one point in the mostly one-sided conversation, he paused for breath.

"What is his name, anyway? You never said."

Lydia glanced at Beetlejuice, caught off guard, and feeling chivalrous, he waved his hand across Benji's face.

"I'm right here, dumbass." Lydia shot him a quelling glance, but he just beamed back at her. "An' they call me Douglas. But Lyds here always called me Uncle Dougie." He just couldn't resist ribbing her a little, and she shook her head, looking as if she was seriously reconsidering her offer of shelter.

"How old are you?" challenged Benji.

"Six hundred and thirty seven," Beetlejuice shot back, and then grunted, calculating. "Depending on which calendar you believe…" he added. Lydia covered her face in her hands.

By the time they reached Lydia's apartment, Beetlejuice was hoping there would be an altercation, because he really wanted to punch this kid's lights out. But Lydia unlocked the door and shoved him inside without ceremony, and then closed the door on him, staying out on the landing with Benji.

Normally he would have been curious, but since he had already heard this conversation eleventy-ten times, he took a private tour of the tiny one-bedroom flat instead. It didn't take long. A loveseat of purple crushed velvet was tucked into one corner, and a tiny efficiency kitchen in the other. A single door led off into the equally efficient bedroom, where a twin bed was squeezed in next to a desk and an impossibly full bookshelf, and a half size pocket door slid open to showcase a bathroom which consisted of a clawfoot tub, a toilet, and a cramped sink, all in different shades of avocado green. Swanky.

Beetlejuice walked the two steps back out into the living room and sank down on the couch to wait for Lydia, since he really needed to ridicule her about her choice of boyfriend. She could have _anyone_—why would she saddle herself with a whiny, overprotective brat? Her smiling face flashed before his eyes. He didn't quite comprehend himself how much… different she looked— no longer the girl-child, but womanly, though still not curvy. Of course, not at all his type... He realized that he didn't even know how old she was. She could be in her thirties, though he doubted she would still be in a tiny little apartment. No, his Lydia was much more capable than that. She must just be starting out.

The couch looked much more comfortable than it had just a moment before. He curled up with his knees up to his chest, and a bone-crushing weariness descended on him like a blanket made of lead. He was hungry, and thirsty, and kinda needed to take a piss, but that could wait just a moment. Just one… moment.

When Lydia came back inside, completely furious with Benji's paranoid coddling and ready to demand that Beetlejuice tell her everything, he was already asleep, snoring gently. Her former poltergeist looked immensely vulnerable curled up on her little couch, and the irony of it disarmed her. Her anger faded gradually away as she watched him there, reliving the events of the night in her mind. His voice calling her name… how many times had she dreamed it? How many times had she wished, during the past eight years of her life, that he would come back for her? When she needed a hero, it was him, always him, in her daydreams and nightdreams. How he would swoop down and do her bidding and fix all the bad people and then take her out for ice cream afterwards. But he had never responded to his name, even when she had dared to whisper it in the protecting dark. Of course, Barbara and Adam answered all of her questions—had they seen him, did they know where he had gone, where was Saturn, could they take her there—in the negative. Finally, when she sensed their growing concern that she was just a little too interested in the dangerous poltergeist, she stopped asking. But she hadn't forgotten.

And now, to see him like this was such a shock. Gone was everything that had fascinated her—his ability to alter reality, and to guide her thought the Netherworld. He couldn't turn into a snake now, or scare the teacher that had given her a bad grade on her English composition, as she had fantasized in her innocence. He was just a man. And a dusty, unwashed one at that. But still, she had taken him in. And Benji, whom she never let stay over at all, was all in a froth about it. But no matter how she tried, she couldn't get it across to him that she wasn't _interested_ in 'Douglas' like that. And she wasn't.

She studied him carefully in this rare moment of calm, just to be certain. He was markedly older than she, with laugh lines around his eyes, though she knew that he was much much older than he would ever look. His hair was wild, and with the corners of his mouth turned slightly down and the dramatic sweep of his eyebrows, he looked a bit like a sulky, oversized pixie. Almost ivory pale, smooth skin… strong hands and arms crossed over his wiry body. She remembered his eyes, although after that first brilliant flash of green she had been afraid to look at him again. Afraid of... she roused herself from her reverie. Not even remotely attractive.

He shifted in his sleep, kicking against the arm of the couch. Lydia crossed into her bedroom and gathered a few blankets and a pillow from a box next to her bed. She made him a bed on the floor, and then reached up and shook him gently. His shoulder was lean and hard under his worn t-shirt. What sort of a man had he been, she wondered. He mumbled something about the sun being too bright.

"Come on, _Uncle Doug_. You're too big for that couch, so I made you a bed." She tried to lift him, and found him much heavier than she had estimated. Up close he smelled strongly of bourbon and sweat, with the tang of blood that concerned her, and underneath it all, a faint smoky, bitter smell that reminded her of a burned-out fire. She tugged again and he tumbled off onto the floor. Unprepared, she lost her balance and accidentally elbowed him in the ribs. Fast as lightening, his hands flew up to protect his face, and he curled onto his side, his knees sheltering his stomach.

"No. Nomore. No." His voice was pained, a harsh whisper. Shocked, Lydia straightened.

"I'm sorry!" Had she hurt him? She didn't think that she had, being neither strong nor heavy. She reached a slightly trembling hand to stroke his back gently. "Shh, it's okay. You're safe." He rocked against her knees, moaned something unintelligible, and slowly subsided from half-wakefulness to sleep. For a moment she continued to rub his back, and slid her fingers slowly across his shoulders. Through his shirt she could feel a strange, contoured texture; something that should not have been there. Intensely curious, she debated lifting his collar, just a little, to see. But then she remembered the strange fear in his voice, and thinking better of it, she lifted the blanket and tucked him in, and then rose to get ready for bed herself, her stomach twisted in knots. She would not sleep well tonight.

And she didn't. Groggy, her head full of troubled dreams, she woke to the late morning sunlight streaming in the window, and violent retching sounds emanating from the bathroom.


	6. In Need of Protecting

**AN: **It's nice to be home. Thank you to all of you that have reviewed-- my lifeblood, and the reason i keep writing. Love you all. And to Doormouse and WitchyWanda, brave and wonderful writers both for taking up this extremely fun and diverse challenge, woooo haa! I only wish that FF actually let us update normally... **  
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**Chapter 6: In Need of Protecting**

At first, Lydia was tempted to pretend that she was still asleep. But the retching turned into groaning, and what might have been the thump of a head hitting the floor, and all her thoughts of the night before came flooding back. She couldn't just leave him like that. Like it or not, he was her responsibility now.

So she climbed out of bed and padded quietly into the bathroom. "Beetlejuice? You… ah, okay?"

He was laying on the floor, his forehead pressed against the floor tiles. He didn't even attempt to look up at her, but she could see that his face was beaded with sweat. "Kill me. Do it quick." His voice was reedy and weak. Not okay, then. And oh, he needed a bath. Maybe two.

"You've already been dead." She knelt down beside him, breathing through her mouth. "You need water. You're dehydrated. And a bath," she added, because she couldn't help it. He rolled over and squinted at her, and then nodded gingerly.

"That might kill me. What's this bath thing?" His skin was almost green, and dark circles sunk his eyes deep into their sockets. He would easily have passed for dead at the moment. He certainly smelled dead. Unwilling to try to pick him up again, she rested her hands on his shoulders.

"Come on. Get up and I'll run the water, okay? You'll smell_… feel_ much better."

He scowled at her. "Alright, alright, I get it already. Gods, I don't even care. Maybe you can drown me and my head'll stop tryin' to explode." He struggled up off the floor and she turned the tap on and plugged the drain. And then poured half a bottle of lemongrass and sage scented bath gel under the tap. When she turned back he was standing, if a bit unsteadily, and attempting to hook both hands under the hem of his shirt. "Jus' snap m'fingers, an never had to worry about actually takin' anythin' off. Dammitall. Hate livin'. Hateithateithateit."

Lydia stepped towards him, and then blushed. What she nearly did when he was asleep she could hardly bring herself to do now that he was awake. But she steeled herself, and reached out to untuck his shirt. "Here. But the pants you have to deal with yourself." He attempted a wolfish grin, but it came out rather lacking. She lifted the shirt to his shoulders and tugged it over his head and down his arms. He grinned a bit more comfortably and turned away from her to attempt to unfasten his pants. She began to protest that he wait until she was out of the room, but then her eyes trailed up the slender line of his abdomen to his shoulders. And Lydia's heart clutched and stopped. "Oh my God, Beej…

The strange contours that she had felt the night before on his shoulders and back stood out in angry red lines against his nearly translucent skin. In her limited experience she could only equate them visually with what a jellyfish attack might produce. But then the horror of the truth of it sunk into her like hot iron nails into ice. His shoulders and back were laced across with ropy scars that could only be whip cuts. Vicious, undoctored whip cuts. He tried to look over his shoulder but wobbled, and grabbed at the little sink to steady himself. "Aw, Lyds, are you sure you can't help me with…" He fell silent, taking in her expression of open-mouthed horror. "What? Am I filthier than you thought?"

She could hardly find her voice. "What… what happened… who did this to you?" Beetlejuice swayed, peered over his shoulder, and then circled unsteadily until he could see his shoulders in the tiny mirror over the sink. He fell quiet, just looking for a moment. And then, with an effort, he smiled.

"Oh, looks much worse than it is. Had totally forgotten, ya know? Long time ago." He turned to face her, so that she couldn't see the scars. She just kept shaking her head, completely at a loss. He sighed and shook his head at her. "Look, Lyds. It's not nice out there, okay? Forget about it. Help me take off these damn pants!" That startled her, and she held her hands up to ward him off.

"No way, Beej. You get in the tub yourself, and I'll help you wash your hair. Just… cover… the bubbles… oh, hell." She backed out and closed the door, flustered. From her bedroom, she raised her voice. "Just tell me when you need help!"

"I already told you I need help!" But she could hear that he was teasing her, even through the door. He was trying to make _her_ feel better. She took a long breath, and let it out slowly. He needed some new clothes, but she didn't have money for new clothes. Benji would rather slit his own throat than lend 'Uncle Dougie' a single pair of jeans. Lydia grinned a bit at the image of Benji working for Juno, matching slashes leaking cigarette smoke. Totally not funny, but she felt the giggles bubbling a bit hysterically in her stomach. Whoo, girl, calm down. Trip to East Village Thrift, a nice big coffee from the local Starbucks, and she would figure out what to do from there. A large amount of splashing and cursing eminated from behind the door, and then a sulky, "Alright. I'm decent." She opened the door to see him immersed to his chin in bubbles, looking quite put out.

"So is this all there is to the whole bath thing? I just sit here?" He scowled at the mountain of bubbles. "And what's that smell? All like some frickin' Upper West End rich-lady-and-poodle spa, or somethin'. Lydia laughed despite herself, and was relieved to find that it felt almost natural.

"Oh, no, Beetlejuice. There's all sorts more you're going to have to learn about, if you want to stay here. Toothpaste, deodorant, soap, dusting, cooking, laundry… " With each word, he sank a little deeper into the hot water. His forehead was wrinkled in misery. She reached out and brushed his hair away from his face, and his brow smoothed beneath her fingers. He surfaced slowly.

"Suppose, if I have to." Lydia smiled at him, and his eyebrow twitched slightly, betraying his amusement. She uncapped a bottle of shampoo, put a sizable dribble in her palm, and worked it gently into his fine golden mane of hair. He sighed beatifically and relaxed, closing his eyes. "I could get used to this…" he murmured.

"Well, don't. I'm just helping you out this one time, alright? So don't get any ideas."

"Oh, I got ideas runnin' all through me, Lyds." But his voice was so gentle, so unthreatening, that she just rolled her eyes at him. The heat from the water was bringing color back into his cheeks, and he looked very human. She began to feel self-conscious, but wanted to wash his back, now that she had him quiet and relaxed.

"Sit up. Let me wash your back, and then I'll let you…um… finish the rest." He gave her the sleepy half of a toothy grin as he lifted himself slowly away from the back of the tub.

"There's room for two in here. You might be able to reach me better…"

She felt herself blush. "There isn't room for two, and in your dreams, B." He leaned slowly forward for her, sighing dramatically, and she could see the scars clearly now. Some of them looked barely healed. She stroked a bar of soup into a soft washcloth and very gently rubbed over his shoulders and upper back. He held so still that she was afraid it hurt, but when she asked him, he only shook his head.

"No, not hurt. No. Just. no one ever… touches me like this. Izzal." His voice was gruff. Beneath her fingers, she felt his muscles tense, as if he was expecting her to react negatively. Her heart welled up with a curious mix of sadness and something she couldn't really identify. Like protectiveness, but not… quite.

"Oh," was all she said. And she dunked the washcloth in the water and squeezed it over his shoulders, and then ran her fingers through his hair and slowly washed out the suds. He was completely still, his expression as solemn as she had ever seen. When she was finished, she rocked back on her heels and stood up, stretching. "Okay, so I'm gonna go find you something to wear… and then breakfast."

He stirred and squinted up at her. "And then?" Somehow, such a short question conveyed an immense amount of possibilities, and she flushed.

"I'll see you when I get back." And she was gone. He smiled slowly. And then turned to the immensely less pleasurable task of scrubbing the rest of the dirt off. He could agree to be clean for her, and even to smell like he had been bodily assaulted by an herb garden, but there were a few things he would not do. And first on that list was tolerating Benji. Stupid name, anyway. Benji would be history in less than a week, or he would wear a dress and sing show tunes in Times Square. One week. He was feeling better already.


	7. Ghosts are People Too

**AN:** So i altered the time frame a little, dragging this into the 21st C because i need a few pieces of technology that didn't exist in the 90's. I know, because i was there. This is actually part one of a chapter that got to be a little too long. It was making me nervous. Hugs and kisses!

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**Chapter 7**: **Ghosts are People Too.**

Lydia pedaled all the way down to 2nd Street in a daze. In her mind her fingers still drifted against the corded muscles of his back, his scars like a road map in Braille. And his casual dismissal… "It's not nice out there. Forget about it." And then, as he bowed his head like a child under her hands, "…no one ever touches me like this…" Was he just reeling her in? She shook her head and the front tire wobbled over a tree grate. She was dating a boy, already. Benji. A real commitment. And Beetlejuice was completely not her type. He was obnoxious and wild… except that he had been so quiet. No longer a ghost, no longer powerful and invulnerable. Just a man. A man though; definitely not a boy.

Bad Lydia, she sighed to herself. But the feeling of his warm, damp skin wouldn't leave her fingertips. As she wandered through the racks at East Villiage Thrift, she found herself fingering soft materials—linens and brushed cotton, silks and well-worn denim. The clothes she picked out for him were nicer than what she normally picked out for herself, but at the register, she paid without complaint. At the drug store, she blushed between boxers and briefs, having not noticed either in the pile of his cast off clothing. Finally unable to stop imagining him in briefs, she grabbed two packages of plaid boxers, along with Caswell- Massey deodorant that smelled like sandlewood, because everything else seemed too modern, socks, and a double pack of toothbrushes. And as she was leaving, she walked by the first aid shelves and put a tube of muscle rub in as well, the kind that helped to heal bruises. Anything else would have to wait until she got paid by the district again. Including the much-needed coffee.

But when she got home, the coffee was already on. Its rich, comforting smell drifted out to greet her as she locked her bike in the apartment front hall rack and shouldered her canvas shopping bag. She unlocked her apartment door to find Beetlejuice wandering around in the kitchen, wearing a pair of her sweatpants so low on his hips that she could see the beginning shadow of the line delineating his abdomen. She swallowed. He was definitely trying to reel her in. Deep breath. In. Out. Think of Benji. Benji made her coffee all the time. Benji looked great in sweatpants.

Lydia set the bag down and Beetlejuice turned and smiled crookedly at her. His hair was just as wild as it had been before, but he looked positively rosy. She attempted a small smile. "Feeling better?" Thank the gods her voice was steady.

"I kinda like this bath thing." His voice was full of mischief, and the warning bells set off in her head.

"Where didja get the sweatpants, Beej?" She cocked an eyebrow at him. He looked down at what he was wearing and then grinned at her. Big warning bells.

"I can take 'em off, if you _insist_…" He made to tug at them and she almost jumped out of her skin to prevent him, her eyes wide and hands outstretched.

"No! No. Lord, no. Keep them. They're yours." She blew out a breath, and his eyes sparkled with wicked amusement. She scowled at him and gestured at the bag. "Here. All for you, Lord knows why." She flopped down on the couch and he brought her a cup of coffee, the cup swaying dangerously in his hands against his swagger. She took it gratefully and freed of his burden, he pounced on the bag, dumping it all out on the floor at once.

The t-shirts he brushed over fleetingly with his fingertips. All dark colors, but she had gotten him a white linen buttondown, which he lifted to the light to examine carefully. He cocked an eyebrow at her. "We goin' out on the town, Lyds?" She simply smiled at him, refusing to be baited. A couple pairs of comfortable jeans, and a dark pair of linen trousers he grinned at, and set them next to the shirt. "I like Italian." But he didn't even look to see her reaction, because he had found the boxers. "Ah, you bought these for me? You're braver than I thought!" He chuckled darkly, his eyes glittering, and she fought a blush.

"21st century, B. People wear underwear."

"I'm flattered you think I'm a person." His voice was low, and he uncapped the deodorant and sniffed it, and then gave her a mildly impressed look. "Nice."

She frowned at him, not even distracted as he rubbed deodorant under each armpit. She was almost getting used to his shocking freeness of action—he didn't seem to be bound by any sort of modesty at all. It was sort of refreshing. But this… "Why would I not think you were a person?" He was peering suspiciously at the toothbrushes, but lowered them as he looked up to meet her eyes.

"Because I'm _not_. I'm a poltergeist." He rocked up onto his knees and crawled over to the couch, resting a hand on either side of her hips. She backed slightly away from him, but he gazed at her intently. "I've been dead for _six hundred years_, Lydia. This is all a bit weird, even for me." And then he just held her gaze for a moment, just as if he were holding her hand. His eyes were a brilliant, almost unnatural green, and the way that he was looking her she could feel like a thready burn in the pit of her stomach. All she could think coherently was that Benji never looked at her like _this_.

The phone rang, startling them both. Lydia reached over to the phone on the little table next to the couch, her hip resting against his forearm. He watched her in unnerving silence.

"Hello? Hi, John. Okay, where?" She reached even further for a notepad and pen, but he didn't move out of her way. She tried very hard to ignore him. "West or east? Oh, in SoHo? Cross street? Grand. Gotcha. Be there in half an hour." She set the phone down and turned back to her accidental flatmate, who at the moment was close enough to kiss. Or bite. Lydia sunk back into the couch, and he gave her a feral grin. She swallowed hard. "If you behave, you can come see where I work, B."

"And if I don't?" And entire universe of possibilities flashed through his darkened eyes, and his voice was barely audible, even this close, as if he were tempting her to lean even closer.

"Oh, I think you might want to see this." She grinned at him. "And Benji will be there."

He rolled his eyes, his carefully crafted spell fracturing in his own annoyance. "Oh goody." He stood abruptly and she was free. She felt his heat go with him. And felt somehow less without it. She stood slowly, and brushed off her pants.

"I'll be out in a minute. I just need a quick bath." She headed to her bedroom and then he heard the water running. He propped himself against the doorframe.

"Need any help washin' your hair?"

"Definitely not!" But her voice sounded a little strained, and he smiled. Maybe he would need less than a week.


	8. Worth

**AN:** So this is actually the second part of what was supposed to be one chapter. That's what i get for having a plan. A free drabble, any subject, to the first person who knows the answer to this riddle!**  
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t.h.e.r.e.i.s.a.t.h.i.n.g.t.h.a.t.n.o.t.h.i.n.g.i.s.a.n.d.y.e.t.i.t.h.a.s.a.n.a.m.e..

i.t.s.s.o.m.e.t.i.m.e.s.l.o.n.g.a.n.d.s.o.m.e.t.i.m.e.s.s.h.o.r.t.a.n.d.p.l.a.y.s.i.n.e.v.e.r.y.g.a.m.e**  
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**Chapter 8: Worth**

True to her word, Lydia was washed and ready in less than ten minutes. She dressed hurriedly, and then grabbed Beetlejuice's shoulder and dragged him into the bathroom. He protested loudly. "Dammit, Lyds, I just _had _a bath. Unless you're getting' in with me, one a day is _enough_!" But she merely brandished one of the new toothbrushes at him.

"This too." He scowled, but took it from her. Living was so much frickin' _trouble._ She squeezed toothpaste on her toothbrush and then on his. And then brushed her teeth in front of him, her eyebrows raised in impertinent challenge.

His scowl got even darker. "This had better be worth it." He chewed gingerly on the toothbrush, and the bristles tickled his tongue. He mimicked her movements, and then spat with relish into the basin. She grinned at him and reached up to wipe the corner of his mouth with her thumb.

"Not so bad, huh?" But his lips parted slightly against her thumb, and his eyes turned a shade darker, and a wash of warmth traveled up her arm. She dropped her hand as if she had been scalded, and then wiped her own mouth with a damp washcloth. "Come on. I have to pack my bag."

"Sure." His voice rumbled down inside her belly. And not until that moment did Lydia feel that she was in way over her head. He followed after her, still shirtless, still wearing her clothes, and she could feel his eyes on her back, and she _knew._ He was trying to _seduce_ her. And it was _working._

But why?

Confused, she turned to him and gestured toward the bag of clothes. "Change? I need you to help me carry my equipment. And you can't show up at a crime scene looking like a Gap model." Gods, had she said that aloud? Flustered, she ducked back into her bedroom for her laptop and camera equipment, leaving him looking back at her curiously. He turned to the bag of clothes and tugged out a black t-shirt and jeans, looked peculiarly at the package of boxers, sneered, and then changed right there in the living room. Socks, and his favorite boots, which had thankfully traveled with him to the Land of the Breathers, and he was all ready to go out in public again. Everything fit really well. He felt a momentary twinge of what felt suspiciously like gratitude, and then it passed. Weird.

Lydia peered carefully through a crack in the door before walking back out into the room with a big shoulder bag. She handed it to him, looking him over and thinking that he still looked like a Gap model. Fellow was dead for six hundred years and looked _that good_ in a pair of secondhand jeans. Where was the justice? Moodily, she shouldered her digital camera and walked out the door, with Beetlejuice trailing behind, wondering when he got voted to be the caddy. Maybe it was that bit in the living room when she totally drooled over him. He grinned toothily. That might have been it. And that made the whole toothbrush thing _completely_ worth it.

"So where are we goin', babe? You said somethin' about a crime scene?"

"It's what I do, B. I take pictures of dead people. See what sort of an effect you had on my tender young mind?" She beamed sarcastically at him.

"Hey, don't blame me!" he protested. "You're the one who could see us. I didn't have nothin' to do with that. You were morbid _way_ before I met you." Lydia hailed a cab, and effectively cut short their conversation. They rode most of the way in silence, Beetlejuice looking out at how much New York had changed, and Lydia just staring off into the middle distance. But once they crossed into SoHo, he couldn't contain himself. "What have they done to this place? It used to be great! And now it's all…"

"Clean? Safe? Trendy?" Lydia looked up at the tall lofts in the former warehouse district and smiled. "I can't afford to live here."

"Do you want to?" He asked her with perfect sincerity, as if he could somehow make it happen. And then, in the next moment, his face crumpled. "Nevermind. I forgot…"

She felt a bit of an ache for him, but didn't show it. "Nah, it's way too creepy here. I love my apartment."

"That's not an apartment, Lyds. That's a frickin' cracker box. I think my pockets might hold more!" He waggled his eyebrows, and she was pretty sure he wasn't talking about his back pockets. She giggled at him, and he grinned back at her, and suddenly she felt alright again. A world where the scary former poltergeist was flirting with her seemed infinitely more normal than the world where he was seducing her. And she _had_ someone, already. Why did she keep having to remind herself? And then the cab pulled up outside the apartment house with all the flashing lights, and there was Benji, back in his rumpled oxford rolled up at the sleeves. He smiled at Lydia, and then his face turned thunderous.

"Why is he here?"

Beetlejuice beamed at him. "Because he couldn't stay away from ya, cowboy." He climbed out of the cab and shouldered Lydia's bag protectively. "And 'cause the lady asked him to come. Any more questions?" Benji stared at him, and then at Lydia, who was looking very stormily at them both.

"Where's the body?" Her voice was chilly.

"Upstairs."

"Diagnosis?"

"Suicide. Powder burns on the hand holding the gun, entry angle looks right. No note, no motive. Ready?" Lydia nodded, and they headed inside. Despite himself, Beetlejuice was curious. He followed the two up the stairs, not even really all that bothered that Lydia walked with Benji instead of with him. That would all change. He watched the gentle sway of her hips a few stairs above him. Very soon.

Inside the crime scene, a few plainclothes cops meandered around and got in the way while Lydia lifted her camera and sidled over to Beetlejuice to slide her hand into the bag he was holding. He was absorbed in looking around the room. "Did wonder-dog say this was a suicide?"

Lydia nodded, too absorbed to catch the rude nickname for her boyfriend. She fed her camera new batteries and a new card and began to circle the site, shooting every inch of it. The body of the man was sprawled on the carpet, a nasty entry wound eating up the side of his head. Beetlejuice knew the exit wound would be much nastier. The smell of blood and gunpowder permeated the room. He set the bag gently down on the table—Lydia would be furious if he broke her laptop—and then slowly roamed the edges of the room, absorbing the surroundings semi-consciously. Bright flashes from her camera blinded him like a strobe, and he had to repeatedly shake his head to clear his vision. He figured he looked more like a dog than Benji at the moment. But something wasn't quite right.

The hand that had held the gun was his right hand… he could see the powder marks. Old gun, from a collection. Ah, there it was, fallen away from the body. Old muzzleloader. Fine gun as long as you were two feet or less from your target. Distance had saved him more than once... Man was old, and surrounded by old things… inkwell, paper, quill pen. Books. Quill pen. Ah. That was what was wrong.

Lydia was coming back around, and he stepped into her path. "Not a suicide," he murmured in her ear. Not to protect Benji's rep or anything—just so he could get that close to her. She turned a quizzical eye to him.

"Why do you say that?" Oops. Benji had sharp hearing. Woof. "It's a typical suicide. Old guy gets depressed, ends it all. I've seen hundreds." His tone was annoyingly superior, and Beetlejuice decided to take him down a notch. Or several.

"Old guy's a lefty, Benj." Did he say that really loud? Goodness. Benji and Lydia both turned to stare at him, along with the rest of the occupants of the room. Well, except for the dead guy. He raised both eyebrows in perfect innocence. "You didn't notice the angle of the pen?" He ambled over to the desk, where the inkwell sat stumpily on the blotter, the pen resting in its holder. And he pulled out his best longsuffering teacher voice for the occasion. "If he was right handed, the inkwell would be on the left side of the blotter. It would get in the way, otherwise. But it's on the right. And the pen is tilted to the left, which means he set it in with his left hand." Lydia was staring at him, and then shot a few pictures of the blotter. She looked at the body carefully.

"But Beej, this guy doesn't have any ink stains on his left hand." She took another shot of the hand to be sure.

"He has ink stains on the inside thigh of his left trouser leg, tho. Damn hassle to get those out." Benji was staring at the streak of ink that he had discounted in the dark as a shadow. He shook his head.

"How do you know all of this?" His tone was mildly accusing, as if he wanted to blame something—anything—on his rival.

Beetlejuice just smiled pleasantly at him. "Because I'm left handed myself, and I have a pen just like that. Damn nuisance. So happy when they invented quick-drying ink. And ballpoint pens for that matter." Lydia elbowed him, but the look in her eyes was much more impressed than annoyed.

"So who killed him, Sherlock?" Lydia had mischief in her eyes.

Beetlejuice shrugged. "Not a dick. Oh, I mean, a detective. Sorry. Pardon my vernacular." Benji was turning an interesting shade of red. At the very least, Beetlejuice had just tripled his workload. And that meant a lot of time at the office. So sad. Lydia was finishing up her shoot. She found the bag where he had set it down and pulled out her laptop. Powering it up, she connected the camera, downloaded the pictures, and burned a disk. Sharpie marker, date, and little paper envelope. She handed it to Benji.

"Sorry. It looked simple." She gave him a gentle smile. He looked at her, chagrined.

"Will you still come out with me tonight?"

"Will you have time?"

"Yeah. It'll take a few hours for the crime labs to process all this. We still have to do fingerprinting, now that things have become more… complicated." He directed an irritated stare in Beetlejuice's direction. "I have your 'friend' to thank for that, I guess."

"Well, he was trying to help." She was beginning to look exasperated again.

"Help me, or help himself? Has he been… bothering you?"

"No more than usual. Look, when you want to pick me up tonight?" Lydia was seriously tired of this uncomfortable subject.

"Seven?"

She nodded. "I'll be ready."

Beetlejuice, who had heard the entire exchange, was caught between smug and irritated. Smug that he had made Benji the Wonder-dog's life a little bit harder, and irritated that Lydia was going out with said dog. His stomach rumbled, reminding everyone in the vicinity that he hadn't eaten, and Lydia swung out her hand to catch his wrist. She looked ruefully at him. "Sorry I'm not taking better care of you, B."

"I thought you said his name was Doug." Benji just sounded petulant now, and Beetlejuice swung all the way to the top of the smug meter.

"Lyds can call me whatever she likes." Lydia tugged him out the door before they could have another 'exchange', but he got off a good grin at the receding Benji. On the way out of the building, Lydia dropped his arm.

"Why can't you two get along?" Her voice was a bit petulant, too.

"You really don't know?" He looked at her a bit incredulously. Women could be so dense. She shook her head. He shrugged. "Then I won't be the one to tell you."

Lydia sighed. Men could be so cryptic.


	9. Truth

**AN:** Sorry. I'm going to upload this before i edit that last bit out of guilt. If i don't upload, i'll never get the next part written. Flame me if it makes you feel better ;)

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**Chapter 9: Truth**

Over spaghetti and red sauce in her apartment, Lydia struggled several moments with which question she wanted Beetlejuice to answer most. He wolfed down two plates in quick succession, and then let out a resounding belch, got up, and filled his plate again. Watching him eat made her considerably less hungry than she had been before they had made spaghetti, but she chewed slowly through a bowlful and a few pieces of bread, just to have something to do. He didn't speak at all, but watched her with his disconcerting green eyes when he wasn't scraping the bottom of his plate. Finally, she settled on a question that seemed to cover all the bases.

"Why are you alive?"

"Don't you have any wine? Italian always goes better with wine." There was a distinct challenge in his eyes now, and she nodded, grinning a little.

"Yes. I do. Answer me, first, and then I'll pour you a glass."

"Pour us both one, and it's a deal." The corner of his mouth was upturned in a wicked half-grin, and she knew she had played well enough. She got up and reached into the cabinet above the fridge for the bottle of Chianti that her dad had brought her from Italy, and that she had been saving for a special occasion. That the 'occasion' was supposed to have been with Benji seemed a minor point. The world held a lot of wine. She could always get another bottle.

Before she could bring it to the table, he leapt up to take the bottle from her, and then fished around in her drawer for a corkscrew. "I haven't done this in ages." His voice shimmered with little-boy glee. With a careful and practiced hand, he cut the foil, screwed in the spiral, and with a quick tug he brandished the open bottle at her with proud grin. He nodded for her to take it, and she made him a little mock curtsey.

"You're too kind, good sir." Her voice was colored with amusement.

"My pleasure. Really." He even pulled out her seat for her before he sat back down and waggled his empty glass. She filled it, and then remembered that he was supposed to answer her question first. There was no denying his amusement now. She groaned at herself, and then went ahead and filled her own glass. He settled back in his chair and fixed her with a contemplative look.

She arched an eyebrow at him. "So, you were saying?"

"I already told you, I'm here because of you." He knocked back the glass in one swallow and held it out for her again. She only filled it halfway. His expression called her a miser. "Because of what I did, because you _asked me_, if you remember…" She merely lifted both eyebrows at him, inviting him to continue. He sighed loudly and hunched over his glass. "It's called a life sentence. Some desk jockey bein' clever. S'really rare, since it's not punishment for most in the Afterlife." He frowned, and she felt his mood change like the sun going behind the clouds. "But for someone like me…" He snorted. "I mean, who are we kiddin? There's _no one_ like me. It's just hell. This is hell. No power, weak as a kitten, can't travel, can't scare… this is like the hell for people who don't think hell is scary."

Lydia had gone in feeling sorry for him, but came out the other side feeling a little angry. His behavior towards her had been directed to one end. And if this was hell for him, then what was she? "So why are you trying to seduce me?"

"What?" He looked around nervously, not meeting her dark stare, and emptied his glass again. She emptied hers as well, and refilled them both.

"I asked why you were trying to seduce me. Are you just trying to ruin my life temporarily, or were you going for permanent damage?"

"Lydia, I…" He swallowed, at a loss. Again. He seemed to be permanently adrift. "I mean, I didn't expect you to be…"

"Dating someone? Older? Grown up? Able to stand up for myself? Am I getting warm?" But her voice was icy. He shook his head.

"I didn't expect you to be so beautiful." He fell silent then, his lips pursed and eyes on the floor. Lydia's mouth went dry.

"I can't deal with this," she finally managed. "I have to go get ready for a date. I don't even know what to say to you." Her volume began to rise. "You waltz in to my life after eight years, B. _Eight years_. Did you know it had been that long? Eight years of me, wondering why you left. Eight years of calling your name in the dark, and you_ never came_!" He was wide eyed, lips slightly parted, and she was standing over him, nearly shouting now. "I waited for you, and hoped that you would _swoop_ down and _save me_ from this life that I couldn't seem to make work. And then I lost hope." She lifted her hand to rub at her temple. "I gave up trying. And _now_, when I have a good thing going… _now_ you drop in, helpless as a baby, and I'm right back where I started."

"_I didn't ask for this_!" He surged out of his chair, his voice rough with frustration, and Lydia felt her skin tingle with a strong electric charge. "I did what you _wanted_, Lyds! You made me a _promise._" That last word came out like a snarl. He slid his hands around the back of his neck and clutched his head as if he were in pain. "Gods…" His voice broke.

At the extremity of his weakness, her anger melted to sadness. "I was young. I was desperate for your help. I would have promised you anything."

"And it would have meant nothing to you, _at all_." He grimaced at her. "I don't mean anything to you. None of this…" He waved his hands, taking in his entire humiliation at once. "…means _anything_."

"That's not true, B." She reached out to him, but he growled like a wounded animal. "Stop this. It's not helping. Dammit, B, I'm sorry, okay? I did what I had to do."

Again, she felt his mood change, like the bottom had just fallen out. It scared her a little. Beetlejuice straightened slowly. His voice was dangerously low, his head tilted gently to one side, and his eyes focused unmercifully on hers. "And that makes it all better?" He took a step towards her, and she had to consciously hold her ground. Another step, and he was so close she could smell the wine he had drank, and the heated scent of him. He was too close, too close, too goddamn close.

She felt his arms tighten around her an instant before he kissed her, mouth open, deep and hot and terrifying, and her body _betrayed_ her for a split instant, her hands clutching at his arms, yielding—and it was long enough for him to _know_.

And then the New York girl took over, and she kneed him hard in the groin.

He dropped like a stone to the floor.


	10. A Different Sort of Hell

**AN:** Yes! BJ catches a break. But it's only temporary, so enjoy the tender moment while it lasts... hugs and kisses.**  
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**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO0000000000000000000ooooooooooooooo00000000000000000000OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO **

**Chapter 10: A Different Sort of Hell**

"Oh my God!" Lydia folded to the floor beside him. He was curled up tightly, moaning and cursing softly. Regret wrenched at her heart. "You scared me! I'm so sorry, but you scared me, and I just _reacted!_ Oh my God, Beetlejuice…"

He breathed out, panting, "I'm… not Beetlejuice."

"What?" She leaned into him, so that she could hear him better.

"I'm not… He wouldn't be writhin' in pain… on this floor." His voice was thready with agony. "He wouldn't be here… at all." He squeezed his eyes shut, and she was horrified to see a tear leak from the corner of his eye. She stroked it away with a trembling hand.

"I'm so sorry, B. Please." She stroked his shoulder tentatively, but he didn't pull away. The texture of his scars underneath her fingertips awakened a fresh wash of guilt. He relaxed slowly under her hand, until he was just curled up against her, unresponsive.

She sighed and stroked his fine white blond hair, feeling the heat of his mouth still against her lips. She swallowed. "Beetlejuice, you shouldn't have kissed me like that."

"How should I have kissed you?" His voice slid over her ears like warm whiskey.

She flushed. "That's not what I meant. You shouldn't kiss me at all. You don't have the right."

"Then you don't have the right to touch me like that." His voice was at once cold and broken, and he pulled away from her, crawled to the couch, and curled up on in, his back to her in silent reprimand. "Wake me in a year."

Feeling thoroughly wretched, Lydia looked at the clock. It was almost seven. Benji would be there in minutes, and she didn't want him to see Beetlejuice like this. She stood and tugged gently at his shoulder. "Come lay down in my bed, B." He peered up at her, surprise coloring his exhausted features. She tried a smile, and it was a little pathetic, but he moved off the couch and stood gingerly. He allowed her to lead him by the hand through her bedroom door, and settle him gently on the bed. He sighed softly as she pulled a blanket over him, and then she went into the bathroom to get ready, wishing she could do anything to not have to go out tonight.

But Benji showed up as promised at seven on the dot, and Lydia left Beetlejuice sleeping on her bed, the regret staying with her as she locked her apartment door. They attempted a nice meal at Lydia's favorite Thai place, the one that served the little spring rolls arranged in spirals on the plate and heaped the peanut shrimp in mountains in the center of the table. Conversation was strained, and more than once Lydia found herself drifting, thoroughly exhausted by her lack of sleep the night before and the stressful events of the day. Finally, Benji snapped.

"Are you sleeping with him?"

She shook herself out of her reverie, uncertain if she had heard him correctly. "What? No! Not even remotely. Where did _that_ come from?"

He looked both frustrated and chagrined. "I can't seem to get your attention tonight, Lydia." He frowned. "I mean, I didn't actually think that you were, since I don't seem to have gained that privilege, and I hope you would consider me before a total stranger."

"He's not a total stranger!" she snapped. He flicked his eyes away, and she flushed, mortified. Totally wrong thing to say. She tried again. "You agreed that I would keep my own counsel about this when you started dating me."

He looked pained. "That you would when you were ready, and not a moment before. Sometimes I think you'll never be ready for _me._"

"We aren't going to argue about this, Benjamin. This qualifies as pressure, and I won't tolerate it. I told you I'm not sleeping with him, and I'm not." She sighed, and softened a bit, feeling guilty even though he was free to leave at any time, greener pastures and other rot.

"Then why was he in your bed?"

"What?" Her voice shook a little. He must have seen, somehow.

"Are you hard of hearing tonight? I asked you why he was in your bed." Benji was getting angry now. Lydia just gaped at him for a moment, before she was able to collect herself.

"He was tired. He slept on the floor last night." Who was she defending—herself or Beetlejuice? She didn't even know.

"Where are you sleeping tonight?" Rage had made him reckless. She threw down her napkin and stood.

"_Too far_, Benjamin. I've had enough."

He stood as well. "So have I. I won't tolerate him staying in your apartment, an apartment I don't even have _access_ to. You've known him for a day, and he's in your bed!" His voice was a harsh whisper now, but still, everyone in the restaurant was listening with rapt attention. Lydia worked her jaw, and shook her head.

"Fine. Good night, Benji. This has been lovely." And she threw down a twenty and walked in dignified silence out of the restaurant, leaving him the center of unwelcome attention. Six months, and one day had ruined everything. One day. And one man. Who was sleeping in her bed. Where _was_ she sleeping tonight?

Lydia walked home. It wasn't late, and she wanted ample time to look over the ruin of her life. Her photographer's job wasn't in any danger, at least, because she was called from precincts all over Manhattan and the Bronx, and sometimes even in Queens. She was on many rotations. No, part of the trouble was dating people that she worked with. She would still come into contact with Benji on a regular basis. That, although irritating, she could handle. What she couldn't get a handle on was the man in her apartment. She didn't even know where to begin.

The key still fit. She supposed that she would have to still live here. The door creaked open, and she peered in. The bedroom door was closed. Closed. He hadn't known, after all. He had guessed, and she, in her guilt, had confirmed it. Dammit. Dammitdammitdammit. When she opened her bedroom door, though, Beetlejuice was awake.

"You're right." He sounded a little creaky, and looked more than a little rumpled by the light of her little desk lamp.

"What about?" Nothing could surprise her at this point.

"I shouldn't have kissed you." He paused, and then mumbled, "Sorry."

Check that. Surprise still possible. Tears sprang to her eyes. Strange that in all that had happened that day, his apology would bring her the closest to crying that she had been in a long time. She sank down on the bed beside him, in great need of comforting. "We're both pretty sorry, aren't we?" The twin bed barely fit them both side by side, so she turned and rolled against him, hiding her face against the curve of his neck. She felt a hesitant hand cup the nape of her neck. Warm.

"Have a nice dinner, Lyds?" He was close enough that his voice was a gentle rumble in her ear.

"Benji broke up with me. He thinks I'm sleeping with you." She grinned then, feeling the little bubbles of hysteria churning in her belly. "I've known you for a day, B, and you've toppled my life like a house of cards. What's on for tomorrow?"

He held her more firmly, then, and his legs relaxed against hers. "That's up to you, I guess."

She sighed and stretched against him. "I think I'd like to sleep for a day," she yawned. "I'm exhausted."

"Where are you gonna sleep?" Caution colored his voice.

She scowled. "Why does everybody keep asking me that?"

"Because it's a good question?" He pulled away from her a bit, so that he could see her face, and the memory of her lips on his threatened to overwhelm him.

She looked at him softly. "I think the real question is, where are _you_ sleeping?"

"Here. You'll have to drag me off the bed if you want me outta here." He smirked at her, humor returning to his voice. The corners of her mouth curled up in response.

"Even thinking of that makes me tired."

"Then stay," he whispered gruffly into her hair. "I'll promise to behave, even."

"Damn my bad timing." She curled sleepily into him, her fingers finding purchase on his hip and collarbone. His mouth was dry, and her body against him kept setting off warm electric sensations. This was an entirely different sort of hell. He slid his arm under her head and cradled her gently, his chin resting gently against her forehead. His other hand settled carefully on the curve just above her hip, but she didn't protest. But he didn't shift or even breathe heavily until she was deeply asleep, for fear that she would wake and change her mind.

"Why are you trying to seduce me, Lyds?" he murmured. She shifted, rolled over on her other side, and he pulled her against the curve of his body, warm and deep. She sighed, her hands sliding over his. As tired as he was, he was awake for a long time, content to be aware of the woman in his arms.


	11. Perfect Gentleman

**AN:** Another part one of what was supposed to be a single chapter. You know, this story was never supposed to be this long. Ooh, and another riddle, too! Same challenge-- guess the answer and you can request a 100-word drabble on any subject. Iechyd da!

In total darkness the thief swallows words, but is never any wiser than when she began.

She may chew on the wisdom of the ages, but will never repeat what entered through her head.

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**Chapter 11: Perfect Gentleman**

Sometime during the night, they had become tangled up, and Lydia woke in the morning to find herself curled up against Beetlejuice's chest, her legs twined with his in the most intimate manner, and his arms wrapped protectively around her. She blushed furiously, and then pondered how to extricate herself without waking him. She could only imagine what he would make of this—it didn't bear thinking about. But the more she wriggled, the more intimately she became pressed against him, until she just bowed her head to his chest, hot-cheeked and flustered. And then she felt him chuckle softly.

"You're awake!" Outrage warred with chagrin.

He grinned down at her. "Yep! Bout half an hour. I've just been enjoying this—specially the last five minutes…" Lydia swatted at him, and he caught her wrist gently. "Hey now." Something in his voice and his jade-colored eyes made her swallow hard, and she broke away from him quickly, standing unsteadily on the floor beside the bed.

"Not very gentlemanly…" she muttered. He settled up on one elbow, openly enjoying her discomfort.

"On the contrary, Lyds. I've been resistin' all sorts of temptation."

"I was _asleep_." Outrage was winning.

"I wasn't." His eyes traveled slowly down her slender frame, lingering on her hips, before he met her gaze again.

She scowled at him. "You're horrible."

He closed his eyes comfortably. "That's one opinion." She stalked to the bathroom and shut the door, and he just smiled after her, savoring the heat from her body that still lingered against him. Being alive had its advantages. He liked the part about being warm all the time. And he suspected she wouldn't be so willing to curl up with a poltergeist. Although… he wished he could have responded to her calling his name. Eight years… Well, maybe he could get her to help him wash his hair again.

(---------------)(-----------------)(---------------)

Lydia took a long time in the bath, just soaking in the hot water. When she had first gotten the apartment, she had longed for a shower, because her long hair was so difficult to wash under the tap. After a few months of struggling with it, she had just cut off her hair. And then spent a week wondering why she hadn't done it sooner. Now she had been here for nearly four birthdays, and she was fond of her tiny little space.

"Lyds?" queried Beetlejuice's gruff voice from the other side of the door. "You comin' out anytime soon? Cuz otherwise I'm gonna have to take a piss in the sink!"

Damn one bathroom apartments! "Okay, hang on! I'll be out in a minute!" She regretfully pulled the chain and climbed out of the tub, reaching for a towel and wrapping it tightly around her body. She opened the door to find him leaning casually against the doorframe, not looking even remotely hurried, and eyeing her with a little half-smile that sent chills shivering up her spine. "All yours, B," she murmured.

"All mine, Lydia?" His disconcerting gaze followed her to the bed.

"Did you need to go or not?" Strain made her voice squeak. She felt very exposed and clutched at her towel nervously. He lazily tugged off his t-shirt and dropped it to the floor, the morning sun illuminating his milky white skin in gold. Goodness but those jeans sat low on his hips. And then, when he was certain that he had her full attention, he gave her a wry smile and turned and ambled into the bathroom. The livid scars snaking across his back made a violent contrast to the gentle sloping lines of his shoulders and arms. He closed the door with a flick of his fingers. She exhaled explosively, uncertain how much more of this tension she could take.

When the tap began to run, Lydia felt safe enough to change, but she did it quickly, remembering with every breath that the lock was on _his_ side of the door. Old comfortable t-shirt… where were her sweats? Oh. She remembered, and then her memory lingered a little longer than absolutely necessary, until she had to shake herself free of it. A ratty old pair of jeans did for sweats. Damn, but she needed to do laundry.

"Lyds!" Beetlejuice bellowed from the bathroom. "Will you come wash my hair?"

"Do it yourself!" She didn't think she could face him right now.

"Please?" Oh, exasperating man. Irritating, helpless former poltergeist.

Stupid, gullible Lydia.

"Fine. Be right there!" She could feel his satisfied grin through the door. She sighed. Where was the New York girl now?

When she opened the door, the mirror was steamed over and she broke out into a damp sweat. "B, you really need to learn to take care of yourself, you know?"

"It's a steep learning curve, Lyds." He was leaning back, completely at ease, his bright eyes closed.

"Washing your hair is a learning curve?" She looked at him skeptically. He cocked an eyebrow at her.

"Being _clean_ is a learning curve. I haven't had this many baths in my whole life."

"B, this is your second bath."

"Exactly. I like you because you're so quick on the uptake, Lyds." She scowled at him.

"Do you want help or not?" Her only power at the moment was in the withholding, and it was flimsy. And they both knew it. But he surprised her.

"Yes." His eyes opened. "I do. Please." That word was getting easier to say, and it _got _him things. He chewed thoughtfully on his bottom lip. Lydia brought a towel to kneel on, and sighed dramatically. Her legs still ached a little from all the walking she did the night before. And she suspected, the position she had slept in. Thankfully her cheeks were already flushed from the warmth of the room. She poured out a capful of the shampoo, and sleeked her hands over his damp hair. He went completely still under her touch, but not the stillness of complete relaxation. Rather, he felt a bit tense, like he was trying to hold still for her.

"Beetlejuice, I'm not going to hurt you." His eyes flicked open and fixed on her.

"Lyds…" He sighed. "I told you I'm just not used to being touched. It's hard to get used to."

"Then why did you ask me to help, if it makes you uncomfortable?" Her voice came out full of concern, and she gently scrubbed her fingertips down the back of his head, trying to get him to relax.

"Because I… I'm not uncomfortable. I like it when _you_ touch me." And they both realized at once that this was a far more dangerous confession than he had intended to make. Lydia's hands trembled, her fingers light on the nape of his neck. He squeezed his eyes shut, afraid that she would be frightened away. But she stroked her hands back through his hair, washing out the suds, and he began to relax again.

After a moment, she spoke. "You are nothing like I remember."

His mouth twitched ruefully. "That makes two of us."


	12. Cutpurse

**AN:** To Wanda: Hope this tides you over till i can get together an epilogue. :grins: . Oh, and occasionally, it is possible that our thoughts intersect in storyspace and two different stories might have similar thoughts/ideas/themes and such, you know? It is purely coincidence. This is just a gentle, general disclaimer. Right then. On with the show.

**o0O0o ****o0O0o**** o0O0o**** o0O0o**** o0O0o o0O0o ****o0O0o**** o0O0o**** o0O0o ****o0O0o**

**Chapter 12: Cutpurse**

She left him in a quiet mood. When he emerged from the bathroom half and hour later, dressed only in the jeans she had bought for him, she was sitting on her bed with a determined look in her eye. "Come and lay down, B"

He looked a little taken aback, but was ready with a show of bravado. "Geez, Lyds, usually I get dinner and a movie first, but hey, if you're in a hurry…" He winked at her.

"Keep dreaming, Beetlejuice. Now come here before I change my mind." He looked at her curiously, and chewed at his bottom lip.

"Why?"

She met his challenge with a wry quirk of her eyebrows. "If you don't come, you'll never know." He frowned, sizing her up.

"You're not tryin' to get me back for wakin' up before you this mornin', eh?"

"Now why would you ever think that, B?" He flicked his eyes to the bedroom door, as if sizing up possible escape routes. She exhaled loudly. "Please. Come here. I'm not going to hurt you."

"You keep sayin' that," he pointed out.

"It keeps being true," she rejoined. He nodded, eyebrows raised, not able to deny that. And then he walked the two steps to the bed and stretched out on his back, his wrist behind his head and the graceful line of his abdomen outlined in gentle morning shadow. She could see his ribs clearly above the sloping hollow of his stomach, and realized that she was staring at the same time he did. He smirked at her.

"Turn over." Her voice betrayed her embarrassment.

"What?" The smirk vanished. Definitely nervous. She was feeling a little nervous herself. She swallowed.

"Lay on your stomach. I'm going to rub some ointment on your back. If that's okay?" she added, wondering if he was going to refuse her. But he complied, slowly rolling over while giving her a wary eyebrow. She realized, suddenly, that this was a great show of faith from him. That even though he was physically stronger than she, he believed himself at risk. And with his back to her, he was essentially ceding her control of the situation. He was trusting her. That was heavy. But he still turned his head so that he could watch her.

"Can I touch you?" He nodded, but all bravado had vanished, and his jade-colored eyes were intent and solemn. She lifted a hand and brought her fingertips down on the nape of his neck, gliding over his scarred shoulders slowly. She could feel his muscles tensing under her touch. "You can tell me to stop."

"No." His voice was a gruff whisper. "Don't stop." She traced the delicate lines of his shoulder blades, which were overlaid with the violent map of his pain, and tears sprang to her eyes. How had he gotten so deep inside her? But that was not the question she asked.

"How did this happen?" She opened the cap on the muscle rub and squeezed some out into her palm. It smelled of tea tree oil and oranges, a strange combination that tickled her nostrils. She smoothed the palmful of ointment across his shoulders with both hands, and began very gently to massage it into his skin. His eyes fluttered closed, and she was wholly aware of what she had just gained.

For a long time he lay silent under her hands, breathing unevenly, lips slightly parted. And then, just as she had suspected he had fallen asleep, he began to speak, drowsily, as if from very far away.

"You've read about the plague. Times were hard. Infrastructure fell apart. You know, if the apothecary died, you were just screwed, 'cuz nobody knew what cured which, and shit like that. Next town was more than a day's ride. Roads were crap. Travel was next to impossible. Things just… fell apart, ya know?" She nodded, working down the middle of his back now. As he spoke, his knotted muscles eased. "So I was apprenticed to a blacksmith, and he kicked the bucket one sunny day, and I was at my leisure. Except that I was a slave, and anyone could come an' force me to work for them. So I had to make my own way, as it were. Stole a horse, and his best coat, the rotten bastard, and became a cutpurse on the roads from London. Wealthy would leave the city, thinkin' the country was safer, or somethin'. We relieved them of the weight of their gold, and the plague relieved them the weight of their souls. Good life, while it lasted." Her hands pressed into the small of his back, and he grunted. "Hey, careful. M'ticklish."

"That's good to know…" she smiled, and he peered up at her suspiciously. "So did you die of the plague?"

"Nah, I already told you I lived through it. 'Sides… had I died of the plague you would _know_ it… I died after, when the magistrate caught up with me." He paused for a long time, and then the corner of his mouth twitched upwards. "Justice. That's what they called it. But he used his own horsewhip. Took a long time." Lydia's hands were still, her mouth open. He fell silent for a moment, and then turned halfway to look at her. "You still there?" She nodded numbly. He rolled over on his side, and his knee slid up to prop against her back.

"Like I said, it was a long time ago."

Her voice was very small. "When you first got here, B… I was making you a bed on the floor, and I… I must have slipped and elbowed you in the ribs accidentally." His mouth twitched in a dismissive gesture, but she continued on. "And then you… cried out, and covered your face with your hands." He looked away, and then at her hands, which were on her lap. "You were asleep," she murmured in apology.

"The magistrate committed suicide less than a month after." He said it in a rush, his voice bleak and rough. "After the urn that held the ashes of his dearly beloved mum shattered into a billion pieces during supper one night." He looked up at her, a benediction in his eyes. "Less than he deserved."

"You drove him to suicide?" Her heart clutched in her chest.

"He saw the error of his ways right at the very end, Lydia." Fierce heat flared in his eyes. "You gonna leave me now?"

"No." Her voice was gentle. Her hand, without her express permission, slid across his breastbone and ribs. He caught her wrist in his hand, a little roughly, and she jumped, trembling.

"You're torturin' me, Lyds. This is worse than any punishment they coulda thought of… to put me here and then have you… for you to touch me like you do and I can't… you won't let me…gods." He stumbled to a halt, his eyes squeezed shut. She had stopped breathing, and had to take a deep breath to fill her lungs before she could speak.

"I'm sorry, B." He nodded, and his grip on her wrist relaxed. He threw his arms wide, one leg pulled slightly up, his thigh against her hip. But she had more to say. "You know, when I first met you, you scared the hell out of me." His lips twitched slightly in amusement. "And that was kind of a new thing for me. I don't scare; I never really did. Until you." His eyes were open now, but he was staring at the ceiling. "But the thing that really mattered… is that you were never scared of _me_." She swallowed, looking down at her hands, and feeling him looking intently at her, now. "All my life, people have been scared of me. My parents, my friends, my neighbors… all but you." She turned to look at him, then, and the fire blossomed in her belly, and she couldn't deny any more that she wanted him, that she loved him, that she had missed him desperately all these years, and now he was in her bed, dear God, and within her reach.

"You've been waitin' for me?" His voice was barely a whisper, like he didn't dare say it aloud.

"I've been waiting for you." The realization was like a beam of sunlight. It answered everything—why she had never been invested in anyone that she dated; why she was always looking over her shoulder… everything. And she smiled at the same time the tears came. He was up in an instant, his hand warm against her cheek, and she clutched her arms around him, her face pressed into his shoulder, and wept, her tears running down his back. And then he was kissing her, but this time she kissed him back, fiercely, her hands in his wild hair.

Lydia felt the wiry muscle of his chest flex easily as he reached around her and slid her shirt over her head. The cool air of the room was replaced by his warm hands, as he tugged her against him, heat soft soaking through her, and the gentle brush of his skin against hers, flower petals, orange blossom flowers. He held her easily, and she felt his strength now, blacksmith's arms, horseman's thighs, as he pulled her down on the bed.

Willingness makes all the difference. When he first kissed her against her will, he only glimpsed what she had carried in her heart. Now she flooded over him, arching over him, taking in as much as she could. Gods, was this the same woman that had dropped him without mercy to the kitchen floor? Her knees were tucked under his thighs, and his hands cupped her hip and her shoulder blade. He rolled gently with her, and she folded against the bed, her legs twining with his as he kissed her jaw, her throat, and then nipped at her collarbone until she dug her nails into his back, heedless of old wounds and making new ones, except that he couldn't feel any pain, didn't care.

The phone rang until the answering machine picked up. It rang again. Beetlejuice flicked out his fingers, completely absorbed in the sensation of Lydia's small teeth against the curve of his shoulder and neck, and the ringing stopped abruptly. A tiny curl of smoke issued from the receiver. And the phone did not ring again. The memory of it was gone from his mind before it even had a chance to register.

And quite a few hours passed before Lydia realized that her phone was no longer working.


	13. Trade

**AN**: Written to "The World Spins", off of Julee Cruise's _Floating Into the Night, _a magnificent collection of floaty, lovely, breathy music even if you have never watched Twin Peaks. Rated **M** for language, violence, character death, and um, well, you've been warned. I'm sorry. I go where they take me. And no, it's not complete. Not yet.

**Chapter 13: Trade**

Screaming.

"_B, have we eaten?" A half-groaning chuckle against the back of her neck, and she giggled. "Food. Nourishment. I don't think I've eaten today." She tried to get up but his strong arms held her from behind._

Someone was screaming.

"_Lyds… do you have to get up?" He propped himself up on one elbow and stroked a gentle hand through her tousled hair._

Brown eyes. Her eyes were brown. But she wasn't looking at him.

"_If I don't, I might gnaw something off." She cocked an eyebrow at him, and he held both hands up to ward her off playfully._

"_Eat! Food is good. Keeps up strength." But he fell back onto the bed, content just to watch her walk to the door, tugging on a robe as she went. His Lydia, graceful and lithe and his. He heard the beep of the answering machine, and a stern voice distorted by old, much-rewound tape._

She wasn't looking at anything. Her eyes weren't looking at anything.

"_Lydia Deetz? I'm calling because we need you down at a shooting. It's… two o'clock now. We're at the corner of Canal and Centre, in Chinatown. Double homicide. Call as soon as you get this. 37463."_

"_Oh, crap. I missed a shoot. Think they're still out there?" She reached for the phone as he jumped out of bed, thinking of a reasonable protest that would keep her there with him. For a week. But she held the phone to her ear, shook it, and then sniffed the receiver. "Burned up…" She raised her eyes to him. "Beetlejuice, it's burned up. My phone."_

The screaming didn't stop. It was beginning to hurt his ears.

_He didn't know what had happened to the phone. At least, he didn't remember anything. Besides, hadn't he lost all of that? He had, hadn't he? She nodded, still looking at him curiously. "Well, maybe we can go down there and see if they still need help. It's not far. Would you come with me?"_

"_Sure, Lyds. Anything you want." And he meant it, to his considerable surprise. _

And dimly, through the darkening haze of his vision, he realized it was _his_ voice screaming, because his throat was raw with it. And it was _his Lydia_ that was in his arms now, not moving. Not breathing. "Anything you want, Lydia. Anything…" He was bowed, broken-voiced, over Lydia's small frame; he might have been crushing her, even, but he couldn't feel it, couldn't feel anything. Faint shouting, sirens… something _not here_. Not in this circle that was him and her. Not here, in the only world that mattered.

An outsider, rushing onto the scene, would have seen nothing but a wild-haired man and a frail, dark-haired woman on the sidewalk, he on his knees and she on her back, a pool of blood underneath her delicate head. And then, a flickering. A shadow of cigarette smoke. Maybe. But inside the circle that he had made, the shouting took up where the screaming had left off.

"BEETLEJUICE! You can't do this!"

"Fuck you, Juno! FUCK YOU! I can do this! I can do this forever, if I have to!" But he couldn't. He had minutes, if even more than one, before he flickered out like firefly light against the darkness.

"Let her go!"

"NO! Get away from me!" His voice broke in anguish. "GET OUT!" But Juno stood firm against his blazing fury. What had been his mortal body was now searing with blinding firelight, and she could hardly look at him. He held the sphere intact with the power of his entire soul, and Lydia's soul was trapped inside it. And he was _not letting go_.

It had happened so quickly. They had gotten out of the cab at the corner that Lydia had indicated, and the street had been dark. He had tried to get her back in the cab, but she had insisted on walking around the back. And he had followed, feeling nervous again in the dark, toting her gear. "Must have gone…" she had said, and shrugged in that delicate, deliberate way that he liked, and they had shared a smile that felt like love.

Her widening eyes, an attempt at a shout, and he had been smashed on the head from behind. He flailed at his attacker, feeling himself falling, the bag being tugged away, and he was reaching inside his coat for the gun that he no longer carried, that he _hadn't carried in more than six centuries_… a loud explosion deafened his right ear, and Lydia… she had just collapsed on the street. He couldn't hear, but he reached for her, and felt the _tug the tug the tug of her soul coming out of her body oh god oh GOD NO! _

Everything that had been hidden inside him, locked away in this mortal body with an imperfect key was unleashed in one blinding explosion of energy, aimed at securing her, locking her in, not letting her go. And he held her, and screamed because it hurt, and it wasn't allowed, and he screamed until he had no more breath, and all that was left was holding on to _her. _"Please…" His voice was nothing but thought now, moving parched lips that had been burned by his own unnatural energy. "I'll do anything… take me. Take me instead."

Juno froze, uncertain of what she had heard. "What?"

"Take me. Let her live. It's my fault anyway!" He looked up at Juno then, and he was crying. "I reached for a gun I don't even _have_, and she's gonna die because of it? Juno, please." He was begging her. Beetlejuice didn't beg. But what he said next shocked her to the core. "I _Trade_. I Trade my life… for hers."

"Beetlejuice, do you know what you're asking? Do you even love this girl? Does she love you?" Juno was stunned. But he shook his head, weakening even as he poured everything he had into holding Lydia's soul.

"It doesn't matter, Juno. It doesn't matter—don't you get it? I don't care if she loves me! Because she _might have_. She _could have_. And that's worth _everything_ to me. And I'm worth nothing without her." He was crumbling, breaking right in front of her, and Juno felt her own tears. She bowed her head. And nodded.

"The Trade is done." She thought that she wouldn't be able to bear watching it happen. But she stood, and did not close her eyes, when she heard the crack of the whip, and his whimpered pain. The t-shirt over his back parted in fine red lines, and blood dripped to the ground underneath him, and onto the body he was cradling, as he bowed, and trembled, and endured dying for the second time. For the dark-haired, pale woman, and as well for the sixteen-year old girl, who would never know what had been sacrificed for her.

It took a long time.

o0O0o

Lydia woke in the hospital. The doctors couldn't explain what had happened, even though there had been eyewitnesses. She had been shot by muggers, they said, and there was a man with her, with wild blond hair, and he had been yelling for help, they thought, and then everything had gotten very dark, although no one told that part in the same way. When the darkness cleared—just a few seconds, they said, she had been on the sidewalk alone, covered in blood. Lydia herself remembered nothing but brief pain, and a strange tug behind her ribs, as if someone had been pulling on her heartstrings, except literally. She asked about the man, again and again, but no one had seen him, or where he had gone, and he did not come for her.

Her own wound, which should have been fatal, was stitched and bandaged easily. The bullet had gone in through her left breast, and come out just outside her left shoulder blade, but had impossibly missed her heart. The doctor in surgery told her it was almost as if someone had pulled it out of the way. Only later, after Lydia had left recovery for a quiet room, did the doctor tell her that she had been soaked with blood when she came in, blood that wasn't her own. And she had been too tired to weep, but had wept anyway, more bitterly than she knew was possible.

Because she knew that he wasn't coming back for her this time.


	14. Available

**AN: **I couldn't sleep.

**Chapter 14: Available**

Lydia's parents came and got her that night. They took her back to Connecticut, to the old house, and she told them everything—all of it, in her terrible grief. How he had come to her, and how she had loved him, and how he had left her and she had lived, when it should have been the other way around. And then she stopped talking, except to whisper his name in the dark. Even that stopped, in time. Charles and Delia were both beside themselves with concern, but Lydia would talk to no one.

Finally, after a week of Lydia's shadow floating about the house in the darkness, Barbara, sick with worry for her health even more than she was horrified that her little girl had been seduced by that monster, made a decision. "Adam, we have to talk to Juno about this. Maybe she can do something! As much as I hate that damn poltergeist, I love Lydia more."

Adam sighed, softly stroking his wife's cheek. "Barbara… I don't know if anything can be done." He smiled sadly at her then. "We can't even change our own clothes, or leave the house. What can we do?"

"We can try." He nodded, and kissed her. "We still have two vouchers, right? She _has _to see us."

o0O0o

"Juno is _not available_. How many times do I have to say it?" The blue-skinned receptionist slammed the little plastic window in Adam's angry face. She had just gotten the damn poltergeist's mess cleaned up, and here he was finally out of her hair _forever_ and some damn newbie apparitions were trying to plead his case. Ridiculous.

Barbara threw open the door against the now-shocked receptionist's hand and broke one of her carefully manicured nails. "This is not about _us._" Miss Argentina flushed a little, turning her already interesting complexion an odd shade of purple.

"If it's about… HIM, then she is REALLY not available. Ever. She is not going to talk to you and that is _that_!" She tried to shut the little plastic window again, and Barbara caught the other side and they struggled furiously against each other for a moment, Adam yelling encouragement to his wife.

"STOP IT!" They all turned, flushing like little children caught in a schoolyard brawl. Juno was livid with anger, trembling in the doorway. "Maitlands! Come with me!" She turned and stalked out of the doorway. And then turned back and shook a finger at the entire room. "I never want to see anyone fighting in here _ever again!_" Barbara and Adam scurried after her, but Adam flashed a triumphant look over his shoulder at Miss Argentina, now a lovely shade of fuchsia, scowling thunderously from behind the desk.

But once the door was closed in her office, Juno sank behind her desk, looking exhausted. She held a cigarette in her hand, unlit. "I don't know what to tell you, Maitlands. It was all done by the Rules."

"What was done? What Rules?" Barbara leaned forward in her chair, and Juno sighed again.

"Have you still not read the book?" Adam glanced guiltily at his wife, and she shrugged. "Well, I guess this isn't really in that book. It's more in the later volumes, once you've decided whether to stay or go on." She lit the cigarette, but let it burn unsmoked for a moment. "Beetlejuice Traded his life for Lydia's. It was all above board. He knew what he was doing. And the Rules are very clear—you can't undo something like that. He should never been able to do it at all. But he was just so powerful…"

"Was? You mean, 'is', right? Is powerful?" Barbara smiled nervously. But Juno just shook her head.

"He anchored her soul to the Living World, you know? Did they tell you?" But of course, no one had. "He held her soul back. He shouldn't have been able to do that. No one can do that… now. And he Traded. A life for a life. I had to watch him die. I watched him die for her." Juno fell silent. And then, "I didn't know he had it in him."

"But how could he have traded? I mean, people can't do that, can they?"

"People _won't_ do it." Juno scowled, and took a deep drag from her cigarette. "There are a lot of things _people_ could do if they just cared less about their own skins."

"But what can we do? He can't be _gone_, Juno. God, I can't believe I'm saying this, but he _has to come back_."

Adam squeezed her hand, and nodded. He cleared his throat, gruffly. "Not just for Lydia. You know, she may get over him. But I think that_ we_… need him. God, I can't believe I'm saying this." He sighed. "I mean, he saved our lives, too, Juno."

"Nothing about any of this is fair. I'm sorry, too. I miss him already. I can't believe I feel that way, but I do. He was always so much trouble. So much damn paperwork. But he's gone. It's done. I'm sorry." And she truly was. They all sat in silence for a moment, and then Adam slowly stood to go. But Juno frowned thoughtfully. "Wait. I don't suppose he left anything of his behind, did he? Jewelry, or a book, or anything like that?" Barbara thought for a moment, and then shook her head.

"I don't think so. Lydia didn't bring anything with her from the apartment. I think she would have, if he had left anything behind."

Juno waved sadly. "Well, it's probably nothing. He was just always so sneaky… it would be just like him to tuck something away somewhere… but how could he have, when the Administration made certain he didn't have access to anything of his own?" She shook her head. "It's over. Just do what you can for the little girl. I don't need any more office help these days. Too much as it is." With that chilling thought, she vanished. Barbara and Adam stared at each other for a moment, and then rushed to get out the door and back to the house.

o0O0o

Lydia came out of her room for the first time in a week, and her parents made her hot cocoa and clam chowder and rice krispie treats all on the same night. She smiled wanly and attempted to eat to please them. Just an hour before, Barbara and Adam had rushed into her room suddenly after having been gone for two days, fearful that she was suicidal and telling her how awful the hours were, and what a bitch the main receptionist was. She shook her head, anxious to reassure them.

"I'm not suicidal. That would be a waste, when he died… when he died to make sure I stayed put. I could just see his face…" She felt tears welling up again—she was getting dehydrated from all the crying. Adam hugged her close, and stroked her hair. "I can't see his face, can I?" Barbara shook her head sadly.

"I'm sorry, baby."

But Lydia came out anyway, and ate, and tried to feel normal again. It was both easier and harder at this house. Instead of thinking, 'I made a bed for him here', or, 'He made love to me here'… she thought, 'He tried to kill my father here', and 'This stair rail was once possessed by him.' The miniature town model was housed in her old bedroom, and she stared at the cemetery until she fell asleep on her hands. And in this way, little by little, she began to feel that life might be worth living again. After another week, she was determined to face her apartment again, even though Charles begged her to stay for another week. But she was ready, and a determined Lydia could never be put off for long.

o0O0o

It was dark when she got home. She wept in the hallway, and again in the living room, where the pile of clothing she had bought for him still lay piled up, waiting. A wild insane hope grabbed at her as she opened her bedroom door, but he wasn't waiting for her. She stretched out on the sheets, and closed her eyes, and cried, and remembered his face, grinning at her from the door, a dark look in his eye that she didn't accurately interpret at the time—how could she have, when he had been in her life, technically, for less than a day? For all of it, they had made a lot of living fit into those few days time. But she had just begun to know him, and now… now she was starting to forget what he looked like. In her memory, he smirked at her, and then held up a hand against a bright flash, and her laughter. Flash.

Flash. Camera flash. Oh gods, a camera. She had taken a picture of him. She fell on the floor in her anxiety to find the camera, and in the next heartbeat a wash of anguish crashed over her. Her camera had been in the bag—the one that the muggers had stolen that night, the night she had been shot. She tried to think… had she changed the card out? Where were her extra cards? But they were all in the bag. Everything had been in the bag that Beetlejuice had carried on his shoulder. In a new wave of grief, she bowed her head.

And then her mouth went dry. Under her desk chair… was her camera. Her hands shook as she reached out for it. It must have fallen out of the bag… and she hadn't checked because she had been in such a hurry, and they been laughing as they had gotten dressed, when he had kissed her and tried to change her mind, his hands where they shouldn't have been… a single tear rolled down her cheek, but this one motivated by joy. Hurriedly, she found the printer in the dark and pushed the camera gently into the dock. The tiny little screen popped up, and showed her the first picture on the card.

With a prayer on her lips, she slowly cycled through the shots. Dead guy, dead guy, blotter, hand, dead guy, old gun… and then, a picture of the city, and what might have been his wild hair, and she shivered in happiness. A shot of the cab… he had taken the camera from her. And then came a picture of her, looking at him… is that how he saw her? In the picture she looked so… in love. Had she ever tried to fool him? She continued through, until she found him. His hand blocking half the view, and the flash of his bright, wicked grin, and an amused, jade-colored glance. Thankfully the camera had found focus on his mouth and not his hand, because otherwise she wouldn't have been able to make out his face, or his expression.

She hit print. And then paged back through, but that was the last photograph on the card. That was all she had left of him. The print ran through cyan, yellow, and then magenta film, and then clear coat, and dropped out onto the drying tray. She lifted it gingerly, and just stared for a moment, tracing his contours with her eyes. He had never been the most handsome of men, although he had been much easier to look at as a man than as the scruffy poltergeist that had given her nightmares. They almost didn't seem like the same person—the ghost and the man. As a ghost he could have lifted her a hundred feet in the air without a strain. As a man, he had lifted her to terrifying heights with just a gentle glance. Well, maybe not so different after all.

"I love you, Beetlejuice. Love, not loved. I love you. Gods, I miss you. Look how crazy you made me—I'm talking to a digital print." She shook her head, and grinned ruefully. "Just think what might have happened if we had spent a whole week together…" But that made her sad again, and she was weary. She set the print down carefully and walked to the bathroom, wishing that she had a shower again so that she could sit under the spray and be pelted into oblivion.

But the bath didn't do anything more than remind her of washing his hair, so she made it as quick as she could, and climbed out, wrapped in a towel even though she knew that she was alone. It was going to be a long night. Lydia smiled sadly down at the picture, reaching to move it to her desk so she could toss and turn all night without wrinkling it. And her heart and hand froze at the same instant. Because in the picture, his hand wasn't blocking the frame anymore. And he was turned toward her, his head tilted and lips pursed in that expression that was always a precursor to mischief.

"Beetlejuice?" She was trembling, and blinked away a tear. The photograph held up two fingers in still frame, and she caught a feral glint of his sharp canines. Her heart was pounding. Juno had asked… Barbara had told her that Juno had asked if he had left anything behind… called him sneaky… she had suspected. Lydia grinned, joy leaking out of her like light. Juno had been right to suspect.

"Beetlejuice!"


	15. The Rules

**AN:** Written to many things, over the course of many days, but try Addicted, Baliamos, Hero, and Escape by Enrique Iglesias. Thanks for hanging with me through this. Hugs, kisses, and maaaaaybe an epilogue, but not until i get over having strep throat. Your reviews and encouragement have been amazing. Thank you.

**Chapter 15: The Rules**

The temperature dropped like a stone had been tied to it, giving Lydia immediate goosebumps. The dim light exploded into flares that made her squeeze shut her eyes. When the brilliance faded, she squinted around the room, her hand up to shield her from the worst of it. Beetlejuice was sprawled out on her bed, still in the jeans and t-shirt of the night she had last seen him, but with a worn woolen naval coat over the top. She crashed into his arms even as he reached up to drag her down, and they ended up on the bed in a crushing embrace, and Lydia never ever wanted to let go. "Beetlejuice…" she breathed into his wild, silky hair. He grinned and brushed his mouth against her ear.

"Hey, now. no more with the B-word, babe, unless you want to send me back?"

"No! Under the same rules, then?" She pulled back slightly to look at him, and somehow her mouth and his met, and his lips were cool and he tasted of ozone and sandalwood and oranges, or maybe that was just in her memory. He tugged her hard against him, and she slid her hands inside his coat, until her fingers tangled in the tattered threads of his shirt, and they both froze at the same time, but for different reasons entirely.

He swallowed, and pulled back gently, kissing her cheek. "Um, not exactly the same, no." His eyes focused on her, and even though his skin was the color of crushed pearls, his eyes were the same brilliantly clear jade.

She absorbed the hesitance in his voice. "What happened that night, Beej?"

"Didn't Juno tell you?" He shifted nervously.

"She told me that you… that you traded your life for mine."

"Exactly!" He jumped on it too fast, raising her suspicion. She frowned slightly, tilting her head as if looking at him from a different angle would make the truth appear. "Life for a life, just like that. And then they tried to boot me, but…"

"Boot you?"

"Lyds, you know ghosts only get to stay if they have unfinished business, right?" She nodded carefully, unsure if she actually understood or if she just wanted him to continue. "So the first time I stayed out of a need for revenge. But this time… well, a Trade is pretty final. You know, no hangin' around to extract gratitude, sign autographs… that kinda shit. So they tried to send me on to the Great…Whatever, except that they _couldn't._" His mouth curled in a delighted half-grin at the memory of it.

"What do you mean, B? I mean, they made you _live_. That's pretty amazing… really amazing, actually." She stroked her fingertip over his collarbone and he tucked his chin in so that he could watch her hand. "So why couldn't they make you go?"

He kissed her forehead, and then murmured against her skin, "Because somebody else had unfinished business… with me." His voice sent a shiver of desire trembling up her spine.

"That would be me." She knew without his even saying it. But he nodded, lips parted.

"You… wouldn't let go. Like an anchor, and they couldn't pull me loose of you. I thought they were gonna tug me in half for a little while, there."

"So they let you stay?"

He chuckled. "I had to find some place to hide out—somewhere to go. So I came here, and found the picture inside your camera. But I don't think that spirits are made to be pixilated. I feel kinda square."

"And now that I've found you, Beej?" Her voice carried a lifetime of questions.

"I don't know, Lyds." He looked solemn. "I don't know what's gonna happen to me. Just don't say my name, okay?" She nodded.

But there was something else she had to know. "Beej, after I woke up in the hospital, the doctor told me that I had come in covered in blood."

He tucked his hair behind his ear casually. "Geez, whaddaya expect, Lyds? You were _shot_."

"It wasn't my blood." Her voice was more statement than question, but he knew there would be no fooling her. He sighed heavily.

"Lyds, you don't have to know this."

"Except that I do, since you gave up your life for me, Beej." Definitely no fooling her. But he did not reach to help her as she slipped her hands underneath the lapels of his jacket and slid it off his shoulders. Her hands slid tenderly over his back, over the shredded tatters of his shirt and the brutal wounds that had not healed. It would be many days of rest before he would be able to heal himself—manipulating his own body was slightly more difficult than, say, shifting the foundation of the Brooklyn Bridge. Lydia looked at him, tears brimming over in her dark eyes.

"Hey, babe, it's okay." He brushed a thumb over her flushed cheek.

"It wasn't a life for a life, was it?" He pursed his lips and looked down at his lap.

"Technically, yes."

"But in practice, it was your death for my life, wasn't it?"

"Hey, I didn't write the Rules." He paused. "If I _had_, well, things might be a little different." He saw a tiny smile flicker on her lips. He raised his eyebrows, mischief hovering around his mouth. "Like, I wouldn't have to wait for an invitation from a certain… beautiful… woman I know."

"I'm afraid to touch you now. Does it hurt?"

"No." He shook his head gently. "It doesn't hurt. But I can feel your hands on me."

"Does it feel different?" she asked shyly.

"It feels like _you_, Lydia. You afraid of me now?" He quirked an eyebrow at her, and she grinned at him.

"Not in a _thousand_ lifetimes, BJ." She was smiling openly now, her sadness at what he had done for her not nearly as powerful as her joy. "You couldn't scare me if you tried."

He gave her a feral, dangerous grin. "That sounds like a dare, sugar." He leaned into her and kissed her, and she pulled herself against him, her hands gripping his upper arms, where his skin had not been torn by the whip. He sank down on the bed on his back, so that she wouldn't have to be reminded of the pain, and pulled her down on top of him. Lydia paused, cocking her head gently to the side.

"Is this even possible? I mean, since you're a ghost now?" He kissed her throat.

"Poltergeist, actually." His voice was just a throaty growl.

"Well, is it?" She was losing the ability to form words, as his mouth found the hollow of her throat.

"No idea. M'sure it's against the Rules, tho…" She felt his whispered smile.

"Good," she murmured, tugging his mouth back up to hers. "Let's write our own…"

o0O0o


	16. Epilogue

**AN: **I don't think I need to mention that this is rated M. I do need to mention, however, that this is for Wanda, who is almost as crazy as i am. Mwah!

this doesn't need to be read. there are no important plot points hidden here. so if it bothers you, the idea of a ghost making love to a girl, well, you've been warned.

**Epilogue for Life Sentence**

When he had made love to her, when he was alive, she had mapped his body underneath her hands. Rather than pointing upwards, something she noticed on the more muscle-bound boys of her acquaintance during long days at the beach, his collarbone made a gentle V that mirrored the angle of his chin, and the hollow of his throat was deep enough to hold a mouthful of water. He was more wiry than muscular, but his strength as a human had been undeniable, even if he had not put much stock in it.

She hadn't been able to see, but could feel his ribs slatted under her fingers, even though he had giggled and twitched when she had touched him beneath his heart space. And his stomach was just a graceful fall from the line of muscle under his ribs to the heavy shadowed ridge delineating his abdomen from his hips—the same line that had showed above the waistline of every damn pair of jeans he had ever worn in front of her, driving her to distraction.

His back was one graceful sloping line from shoulder to hip, bowed gently on both sides of his spine, and his shoulder blades nearly invisible unless he was flexing his arms back. That was partly because his scars were so thickly massed on his shoulders, obscuring all of the more delicate shadows, and partly because of the casual way he held himself, relaxed enough when he was standing to go to sleep.

And now… he was different. There was no denying it. The healthy flush of his human skin was gone, replaced by a pale opalescent glow that caught the light in strange and unimaginably beautiful ways. And in the darkness, he reflected moonlight like a pool of water rather than absorbing it. It was disconcerting and lovely at the same time, and she realized after quite a long time that he was watching her, feigning unconcern, as she stared, entranced, at the swirling patterns of light on his skin.

"Not what you expected?" His voice was tinged with a slight defensiveness, even though he did his level best to sound completely disinterested. She kissed the slope of his stomach, underneath where his heart lay still in his breast, and looked up at him, her brown eyes heavy with shadow.

"You have never been anything like I expected, B." She smiled gently at him, and he reached to tuck her short hair behind her ear. His touch was cool and faintly electric, and she could feel his fingertips even after they were gone.

"Does this bother you, Lyds?" His voice was gruff and pained. "Because I can..." His forehead wrinkled in concentration, and she jumped up, startled, as his skin flushed with pink and the hollows under his eyes lightened. And then he was laying before her, looking as human as when she had last seen him alive. She gasped in astonishment, and then stroked her hand over his chest. He pulled her up to him and kissed her, and he was warm.

But she pulled back. "Beej, how can you… this isn't real." He frowned at her.

"Lyds, whatever you want me to be, I can be."

Her voice became very serious. "I want you to be you. Nothing more than you. I know what you are, Beej. And that's what I want. You." She crossed her arms in front of her breast and crooked an eyebrow at him. He grinned at her, flashing sharp canines, and the warmth left his skin as if somebody had pulled the plug.

"Anyone ever tell you you're cute when you're angry?"

"Shut up, B…" she said warningly.

"Hey, I thought you wanted me to be _me_! Can't say that an' then tell me to shut up, Lyds. Contradiction in terms, that. Hey!" Because she had leapt on him, hands tangled in his wild hair, and held her mouth a fraction of an inch from his. He moved to try and catch her lip with his teeth , and she just barely moved back in time, grinning now.

"I bet I can make you shut up."

His hands grasped her hips and he flipped her over, planting a knee on each side of her hips. She caught hold of his shoulders, and could feel his muscles tense as he settled himself against her. "I bet I can make you howl." He flicked his fingers and her shirt vanished, and she was naked to the waist underneath him. He flashed a deadly grin as she flushed.

"Not fair, B…" But her voice was hazy with desire. And there was no longer any conversation to have, nor any other reason to wait. He was here with her now, and each kiss felt like homecoming. He mapped out her body with his mouth as she arched against him, her hands searching for purchase, her skin tingling with an electric charge. And when she bit gently against his left breast he moaned and phased out, and her hands and mouth fell through him for a moment, until he chuckled and regained his solidity.

"Oops. Sorry 'bout that." She grinned and bit him again, and he clung to form with intense concentration, eyes closed and lips parted, and it was only after that she realized that he was warm under her hands, as if some sweet fire had blossomed in his focus. She tugged at the waistline of his jeans, and he easily obliged her, his hands holding her hips now, and her hands smoothing over his tortured back, healing him, stroking away the tears even as he was rocking against her, inside her, all around her.

And she was pouring herself into him, and he into her, until it was he that was gasping as he pressed his forehead against her collarbone, and she that felt the lines of power that connected him to everything, and the vast blinding connection between them, until the white searing heat tore through her and she was shaking, pulling him as close as he could come to her, crying tears of joy and spilling out all of her grief, as he let loose the memories of his pain, the terror of losing her, the great vast silence of Death.

o0O0o

When he could find his voice again, and it could be used for saying anything other than her name, he kissed her damp forehead as she lay collapsed against him. "Yep," he whispered. "Definitely against the Rules." She let out a weak chuckle of laughter, and kissed his throat, the only part of him that she could reach without having to move.

"I could… see things, B. I could see…" She fell silent, willing to just let it drift in her mind, unexamined, for the moment.

"Oh, don't worry… Juno will be here in the morning waving a stack of forms you have to fill out."

"She can wave all she likes, B. I won't tell a living soul." She snuggled against him, and he reached around to stroke her hair. "No one would believe me, anyway."

"I believe you." His voice was just a whisky whisper in the dark. Lydia murmured something unintelligible, and then faded off to sleep.

It was only in the morning that he realized that his wounds were gone.

o0O0o


End file.
